


The Feeling When It Falls Apart

by Sunlit_Capybara



Category: Voltron: Legendary Defender
Genre: Background Relationships, Beyond canon-typical violence, F/M, Mental Health Issues, No Season 3 Spoilers, Shiro (Voltron)-centric, Team Dynamics
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2017-07-13
Updated: 2017-12-21
Packaged: 2018-12-01 13:15:09
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 7
Words: 47,752
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11487150
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Sunlit_Capybara/pseuds/Sunlit_Capybara
Summary: Now that Shiro's back, the Paladins are trying to reconcile the dynamics that developed in his absence with returning to their old roles. They (especially Shiro) need some nice, simple missions and some time to regroup. You know, be a team again.Too bad instead they get a rescued prisoner claiming to be a Garrison explorer and a conflict that threatens to tear the team apart.(Diverges after Season 2 because of my slow af writing)





	1. Prologue

**Author's Note:**

> This started as a self-indulgent stress-relief one-shot that spiraled out of control because I was having too much fun trying to incorporate ALL THE SHIRO HEADCANONS. It still has some very self-indulgent elements, but I tried to keep those to a minimum. 
> 
> There is some violence that is beyond canon-typical, and references to past violence. I'll try to update tags as things come up if I forgot.

The door to the dorm room opened with an understated whoosh; the person who rushed in as soon as it opened was not understated at all. “Shiroooo!” Matt called, dropping his backpack and coat on whatever furniture was handy. 

Shiro looked up from his desk and swiveled his chair around. “Some of us are trying to _work,_ Matt.” His voice didn’t hold any real annoyance.

“You’re not gonna want to work when you hear my news.” Matt was bouncing on his bed in excitement, his head nearly hitting the poster of the Pillars of Creation that covered the slanted ceiling. 

Shiro just raised his eyebrows. “Are you going to tell me, or…?”

Matt kept bouncing, grinning. “You know Yabani Onwudiwe?”

Shiro frowned at Matt’s teasing. “Would you please drop it?”

“No, no, you’ll want to hear this. So remember how Onwudiwe was having lunch with a couple cadets?”

“Yes, and we didn’t get picked for it, that’s not news.” Shiro turned back to his physics homework, a little annoyed Matt was (yet again) bringing up something that was still, to Shiro, a fresh wound. 

“I _know_ we didn’t, that’s why I begged my dad to get us in.”

Shiro whipped back around. “You _what_?” 

“He says I can’t ask him for anything else like, ever, but yeah, _we’re in!”_ Matt stopped bouncing at the sight of Shiro’s shocked expression. “You’re not gonna get annoyed and uptight that I pulled some strings, are you? Because they’re adding chairs for us, it’s not like we’re kicking anyone out, and seriously don’t be annoyed and uptight, okay?”

The words took a moment to sink in, because Shiro was still stuck on the fact that he was going to be face to face with one of his heroes. He reminded himself to close his mouth and took a breath before answering. “This is lunch with the best pilot of our generation, so I’m going to let you use all the connections you have to make it happen.” He jumped up and lifted Matt off the bed in a hug. “I knew there’s a reason I hang out with you.”

“Shut _up_ and put me down!”

A few weeks later Matt and Shiro found themselves at a round table with twelve place settings (even though the table was really meant for ten and it was a little crowded), wearing their best dress uniforms. All but one of the seats were taken by a cadet, the overlapping conversations hushed and excited. 

“He practically saved the whole Galileo mission—”

“That flying during the second Mars mission, when they got caught in that dust storm—”

“—couldn’t believe they didn’t crash that time, no one else could fly like that –”

“Calm down,” Matt told Shiro quietly. “I can see you drumming.” Shiro stopped tapping his fingers on his leg under the table. “You must be pretty excited.”

“He’s my hero. Of course I am,” Shiro whispered, and Matt smiled contentedly. Seeing his friend’s grin, a thought struck Shiro suddenly but with certainty. “You did this for me, didn’t you?” he asked. “You think Onwudiwe’s great, but you didn’t care we didn’t get picked – you set this up so I could come.”

Matt shrugged. “I asked my dad if they could add a chair for you, that’s all.” He paused. “Okay, I might have begged him a little bit, and promised Katie I’d mow the yard every week next summer if she’d work on Dad at home, and maybe I got Mom to help too—”

“Matt!” 

“It’s worth it, okay? You’ve been talking about Onwudiwe since you got to the Garrison, and it broke your heart when the list went up and you weren’t on it, so it’s worth it. I’m glad you’re happy.” He shifted a little, embarrassed. “Anyway, after I finally convinced Dad – okay, it really took Mom getting in on it to get him to agree, but she likes you – he said he might as well ask for two seats so I could go with you.”

Shiro wanted to hug Matt, but settled for a smile for now. “Thank you. I couldn’t ask for a better friend than you, Matt.” 

Matt cleared his throat. “Don’t go getting all emotional on me.”

Shiro ducked his head. Changing the subject, he asked, “Your mom likes me?”

Matt rolled his eyes. “Of course she does. Everyone likes you, idiot.” He sighed dramatically. “My whole family would swap you for me in a second. Even Gunther. My own dog has betrayed me.”

“That’s not true,” Shiro said, although internally he agreed that he was Gunther’s favorite between the two of them. Probably because Shiro always made sure he had treats when he went to the Holts’. “I can’t believe you went to all that trouble for me.” 

Matt looked at him in exasperation.

The door opened, the room fell silent, and all eleven cadets stood and saluted as a tall, handsome black man entered. He gave them a welcoming smile and said, “At ease, cadets.” Shiro glanced at Matt and noticed he was sweating nervously. None of them sat until Commander Onwudiwe had taken a seat first. 

“So, how’s everyone doing?” he asked easily. Matt and Shiro glanced at each other in confusion – they’d expected someone much more formal. The other cadets seemed to be just as surprised. Onwudiwe glanced around the table. “Really? No one? They told me you’d have questions.”

“What was it like to save everyone on the Mars mission when you had to fly through that dust storm?” a younger cadet blurted.

Onwudiwe picked up one of the bowls of food and started serving himself salad. “Honestly? Terrifying. I shit my pants. And it is not comfortable to sit in a shitty space suit for two days.”

Matt and Shiro stared in shock. 

The commander laughed. “Stop looking so surprised. If you’re going to be pilots on exploratory missions, and not just running shipments to the moon base, you should know there’s going to be some less-than-glorious moments.”

“But, sir—” another cadet started.

“Yabani, please. This is an informal Q and A--” another grin – “with the students I’m told are the most promising in the upper levels.” Shiro glanced at Matt again, who seemed to be sweating just as hard as he was.

“…Yabani. None of us are pilots,” the cadet continued, turning red.

_“None_ of you are pilot track?” he asked in disbelief. The cadets all shook their heads. “There are pilots in the program, though, yes?” Again, they shook their heads. “Then what the hell are they training you all to do?”

Shiro and Matt looked at each other, and it was Matt who answered. “Astrophysics, mechanics, running experiments—”

“Well how the hell are you supposed to do any of that if you don’t have pilots?” he asked heatedly. Matt turned red, looking down. Yabani sighed. “Sorry. I’m not angry with any of you. I just assumed they were having me talk to pilots. I barely know anything about astrophysics anyway.”

Shiro could cite half a dozen groundbreaking academic papers with Onwudiwe as first author that argued otherwise, but he wasn’t going to be _that guy._

“There’s no pilot track, sir.”

“There’s no…what in the actual and goddamn fuck.” He didn’t emphasize the swear words at all, which somehow made it worse. “I’m speaking like my crew mates. Apologies.” After a deep breath, he said, “Let me explain myself. I got a call asking me to have lunch with cadets, and I assumed it was because they’d finally reinstated the pilot track. Since we now have a budget for space exploration again. But now you’re telling me there’s still no pilot track…?” He trailed off, looking around for confirmation. A few cadets nodded. Yabani pursed his lips. “Well. That’s a conversation for another time.”

After a moment’s consideration, he continued, his voice serious. “So I’m about to give you a different talk than I planned. Whenever the Garrison reinstates the pilot track, consider switching. From what I hear, you’re the most talented students we have, and if we’re ever going to recover from the slowdown in exploration this last decade, we need more pilots. Desperately. I’m about done with space travel. We don’t have anyone on deck who’s skilled enough to pilot anything other than the most basic missions. And I’m going to be out of commission for a few years anyway soon.”

Everyone perked up at that. “What are you going to be doing?” someone asked.

“Training simulation for long distance space travel. Just me, my crew, and a simulator on a deserted island.”

“Long distance like Kerberos?” Matt asked excitedly. His father was finishing up a proposal for the first manned mission to the edge of the solar system (now that the government was accepting grants for exploratory missions again), and Matt was a little obsessed.

Again Yabani gave them that bright grin. “Farther.”

The sound sent shivers down Shiro’s spine. _That_ was why he’d set his heart on becoming an astronaut, certain it was what he wanted before he could even write more than his own name. _That_ was why he’d spent long hours studying to get his grades high enough for the Garrison while his classmates were playing impromptu baseball games and hanging out at the mall. Because the Galaxy Garrison was the only possible route for a person to explore the millions of worlds that lay just outside of their reach, to see other suns and all the wonders of the universe. And Onwudiwe – one of his heroes, the man who broke records and sound barriers and all expectations of what humans could do, was going to be the first out there.

Shiro vowed he wouldn’t be far behind. 

“How long will you be gone for?” someone asked.

Yabani shrugged. “Not sure yet. I guess until one of us decides we can’t stand the others. Part of the experiment is finding out how humans cope with being stuck in the same space with the same people.” He grinned. “Because in space no one can hear you scream at your medic for stealing your last candy bar.” The joke wasn’t that funny, but Shiro and Matt both laughed anyway. The pilot served himself some pasta and passed it the cadet nearest him. “So what other questions do you have for me?”

Someone asked a question about what was his favorite mission – and though Shiro kept a blank expression, he wished he could roll his eyes. It was a filler question, useless. Who cared what Onwudiwe’s “favorite” mission was when all of them were astounding? The cadet was wasting their time. 

His mouth was dry, but damned if he wasn’t going to ask – he might never have another chance. Even if the thought of trying to put his thoughts into words in front of all these people made his palms sweat. He gulped his water desperately – too cold, it hurt his teeth, ow – 

“Who’s next?”

Before someone else could break in (or he could stop himself), Shiro swallowed the mouthful of water and blurted, “How did you do it?”

Yabani fixed him with a level look. “How did I do what?”

Everyone in the room was looking at him now. What had he started? Why had he opened his mouth before he found the right words? He never did that, he could never think of the words he needed quickly enough. He could feel his face heating up as he tripped over the words. “Just…what you do, how you – how you—”

Takashi Shirogane, all of seventeen and a student at the Galaxy Garrison (if not “one of the most promising”, apparently), was about to burst into tears from sheer anxiety in front of his hero and a roomful of his peers.

“It’s okay, cadet. Take a deep breath. Take your time. Patience yields focus.”

Patience yields focus. He liked that. Shiro took a deep breath, using the time to gather his thoughts. When he opened his mouth again, he had the words he needed. “When you were our age, no one expected you to be a pilot on space exploratory missions. There was no Galaxy Garrison. So how did you get from being a teenager in Nigeria to being not just the best pilot, but the only pilot anyone wants for their missions?”

Yabani grinned. “Good question, cadet. Hard to answer.” He paused. “Like you said, there was no Galaxy Garrison. I got my start as a pilot in the Nigerian air force. That was really the best way to become an astronaut then, believe it or not. Not like today, when you have your own academy.” After a moment, he continued. “I wish I could give you a clear answer, say ‘do this and then this and take these classes and it will work out,’ but that’s not how it is. I think, the best I can tell you, is try to be the best at what you do. The absolute best. And be diligent, and patient with yourself, but don’t give up. That’s how most of my crew and I got where we are. Being diligent, and being the best.” He rolled his eyes. “And for the love of God, learn to pilot a spacecraft. I don’t care if you have to break into the old Apollo simulator at one in the morning, just learn to fly. We need you all to soar if we’re going to see any of the universe before we all die of old age.”

Shiro could barely hear what was said during the rest of the lunch, because Onwudiwe’s words were ringing in his ears. _We need you all to soar._

**  
A month later, every Garrison student received a communication announcing the reinstatement of the piloting specialty track, the language stilted and formal. The Garrison hoped all students with an interest in piloting would consider adjusting their individual development plans in light of this exciting opportunity. Commander Iverson had dedicated several office hours to discussing the piloting track with any students who wished to learn more. 

Shiro ran to Iverson’s office and signed up for the first open appointment slot. 

**

A week after that, as he and Matt puzzled out a problem set, Shiro tapped out a pattern with his fingers on the desk. Time to bite the bullet. “Matt.”

“Yeah?”

Shiro tapped faster. “I requested a transfer to the pilot program last week. I passed the tests today.”

Matt swiveled his chair to gape at his friend. “You what?”

“I’m going to be a pilot.”

Matt looked…betrayed. “You’re switching?”

Shiro tried not to wince at the bewilderment in his friend’s voice. “We’ll still see each other. We’re still roommates. And I can apply to pilot the Kerberos mission if your dad gets the grant.” He attempted a shaky smile. “We could go to the edge of the solar system together.”

Matt snorted. “Yeah, like they’re gonna let a teenager pilot the farthest manned exploration in human history.”

As he’d been doing regularly for the last few weeks, Shiro reminded himself that patience yields focus. Matt was shocked and hurting and lashing out. “We always knew it was a long shot for both of us to get picked for the same mission,” he said, trying to be kind. In a quieter voice, he added, “It’s my dream, Matt. I always wanted to be a pilot. Now I have a chance.”

Matt deflated at that. “I know. You’ll just start hanging out with all those jocks they recruit for the pilot program and we’ll never see each other.”

“Nope. Not going to happen.” Shiro grabbed Matt in an awkward, one-armed hug – it was the best he could do with the table between them. “You’re always going to be my best friend.”

Matt gave him a shaky smile. “I just don’t understand why you’d want to give up the glorious world of astrophysics for something as mundane as piloting. I mean, come on –” he gestured at the papers spread across the table – “all the girls love sexy, sexy equations. Sweaty gross muscular pilots are a dime a dozen. This switch is gonna destroy your sex life.”

Shiro buried his face in his hands, shaking with laughter and relieved that Matt wasn’t too unhappy to make jokes.

“But in all seriousness, Dad is gonna be so disappointed. He wanted you for a research assistant.”

Shiro shook his head. “I don’t understand why. I’m not even that good at physics.”

“Sure you are—”

“Only because you carry my ass,” Shiro cut in, glad he was able to keep the bitterness from his voice. 

Apparently not entirely, because Matt glanced down, looking shamefaced. “I help, because that’s what friends do. And you’re comparing yourself to the astrophysics track at the Galaxy Garrison – that’s a pretty high bar.”

“But those are the people I’ll be fighting against if I want to get picked for missions, Matt. If I want to be picked for exploratory missions I need to be the best. And I’ll never be the best at astrophysics. But I _can_ be the best pilot.” 

Matt’s mouth twisted. “You practiced that, didn’t you?”

It was Shiro’s turn to look shamefaced. “I wanted to make sure I got the words right.”

Matt sighed friend sighed shifted in his seat uncomfortably. “Look, Shiro. I know you worry about it, about saying the wrong thing. I know you worry about it a lot. But --- I want you to know, whatever words you say to me, they’ll always be right.”

Shiro tried to remember a time when a friend had said something more kind, more perfect, to him, and couldn’t. So he grabbed Matt from across the table and hugged him tightly, only letting go when Matt started whining about the corner digging into his stomach. 

**

“Shiro.” 

He looked from his study sheet up to see Matt standing in the door. It was the middle of the day – Matt should be in his father’s lab, working on research for the upcoming Kerberos mission. Shiro should be studying for his pilot certification exam next week. This was all wrong. 

“Matt? You okay? What’s going on?” Shiro couldn’t help thinking his friend looked like he’d seen a ghost. 

“Turn on the news.”

Without hesitating, Shiro pulled up a live feed on his computer. There was footage of a giant conflagration on a tarmac, with BREAKING NEWS emblazoned in the upper corner. The scrolling text at the bottom was just slow enough for him to read: “—Dead in Training Accident.”

He turned on the sound. “—all members of the Galaxy Garrison training crew are presumed dead. The three crew – Commander Yabani Onwudiwe, Lieutenant Miguel Rodriguez Flores, and Lieutenant Wei Zhuang – were participating in a training simulation for long-distance space travel.”

Shiro didn’t follow the details when the announcer continued. In later days they’d become facts he could call up at a moment’s notice. But for now, the words washed over him, not sinking in.

A training accident. On a tarmac on some empty rock in the Pacific. 

If Yabani Onwudiwe wasn’t going to live to old age, it was a cruel twist of fate that he died on the ground instead of in the sky where he belonged. 

One thought managed to break through the shock and sadness: if Onwudiwe were dead, who was left to pilot the Kerberos mission?

_We need you all to soar._

Shiro turned off the computer and stood up. Matt was studying him with a worried expression. “Are you okay? How are you feeling?”

Shiro shook his head. “I can’t, Matt. I can’t—” he shrugged helplessly. 

Matt nodded. “I know, Shiro. It’s okay. You don’t need to say anything.”

Shiro headed for the door.

“Where are you going?” 

“The simulator. I need to do…something. I can’t just sit.”

After a moment, Matt said, “If you’re not back in a couple hours, I’ll come check on you, okay?”

Shiro nodded. 

Damned if he wasn’t going to soar.


	2. Chapter 1

“Hold it, everyone. They’re still getting into position, so we don’t want to tip anyone off before they’re ready,” Shiro said over the comms unit. He and the other lions, minus Green, waited in their hangars, the castleship hidden behind a nearby moon and out of sight of the Galra prison. His hands clenched as he heard the background conversations between Pidge and Kolivan. He wanted to be out there – he _should_ be out there. A member of his team was on the ground, might be in danger. But that wasn’t part of the plan. Pidge would be fine, he reminded himself, his team would be fine, as long as they stuck to the plan. 

Kolivan and Lidur, Kolivan’s new second-in-command, had joined them on the castle a few days before. Kolivan hadn’t even greeted them before starting in. “One of our operatives has found a target that, if taken out, will limit the Empire’s ability to produce weaponry,” Kolivan had said. “We ask for your help to destroy it.” 

Allura had looked miffed. “And hello to you, too, Kolivan. You haven’t even introduced us to your comrade.”

“I apologize, Princess, but we have been searching for the Empire’s source of anglese ore for some time. It is critical to destroy the mine as soon as possible, but we cannot accomplish this task on our own.”

Allura looked like she wanted to roll her eyes, but restrained herself. “Come to the bridge and let’s talk.”

As they started down the hallway to the bridge, Kolivan grabbed Shiro’s shoulder and held him back. For a moment, the big Galra stared at Shiro, his eyes searching. Then, quietly, he said, “It is good to have you back, Black Paladin.” 

Shiro nodded and answered simply. “It’s good to be back.” He wondered if Kolivan would say anything else – no one had much to say about his absence, it seemed. But Kolivan just dropped his hand from Shiro’s shoulder and strode down the hall. After a moment, Shiro followed, meeting Allura, Coran, the two Blades, and the other paladins in the bridge. 

When Allura had pulled up the star map, Kolivan had pointed out a small planet in an isolated system near the far reaches of the Empire’s control. “Our source discovered that the Empire is obtaining anglesium through a mining camp on this planet in the Oplene System.”

“What’s anglesium?” Hunk asked. Shiro had been wondering the same thing. 

“It’s a metal, an inferior substitute for luxite. Many of the weapons the Empire has created in the last few decafeebes require anglesium, including artificial limbs and, we suspect, the suit of armor Zarkon used in his battle with Voltron. Princess, if you would zoom in.” Allura complied, showing that two small satellites orbited the planet in question.

“Why do you need us for this?” Keith asked. “The last time you needed our help, it was taking down Zarkon, not just disabling something as small as a mining camp. Can’t your people on the inside sabotage it or something?” He leaned away from Lidur, who seemed fascinated by Keith and was standing much too close. Shiro was torn between amusement and pity at Keith’s obvious discomfort. 

Kolivan was shaking his head before Keith even finished speaking. “Subterfuge is too complicated. It would take quite some time to get a Blade into the camp, and sabotage is better suited to information gathering than shutting down an entire operation.” He turned back to the star map. “The planet is uninhabited except for a mining camp the Empire created. There they mine the raw anglese ore and ship it to processing sites closer to the center of the empire.”

“So you need Voltron to blast the mine? Do we get to use lasers?” Hunk asked. Pidge rolled her eyes. 

Kolivan hesitated. “Again, it’s more complicated than that. The Empire is using forced labor to mine the ore. We assume you would object to harming the prisoners.”

“You’re right about that,” Shiro said harshly. He glanced at Pidge, who had gone completely still. 

“So we blow some stuff up to distract the guards, free the prisoners, and _then_ blast the mine?” Lance suggested. Shiro noticed he was looking at Pidge sidelong, not-so-subtly checking up on her as well.

Again, Kolivan hesitated. “Kolivan, if you say ‘it’s more complicated’ again—” Allura snapped. She had gotten over her initial distrust of the Blade, and she and Kolivan got on well for the most part, but his gruff manner and hesitancy about taking risks sometimes irritated her. 

“The situation _is_ more complicated.” No one could say Kolivan didn’t give as good as he got in an argument. “The planet’s atmosphere is poisonous to most beings, including Galra. While the air will not kill us instantly, it will cause severe damage to our respiratory systems within a few hours. The Empire created a biodome over the mining camp to maintain a habitable atmosphere. I fear that we will need to sneak into the mining camp to distract the guards and disable defenses. Such a task is beyond the capabilities of the Blade.”

“Do you know how many guards are at the camp?” Shiro asked. Even as he did, a part of his mind recognized that there had been a time – not that long ago, really – when he would have agreed without hesitation. 

“We guess close to a fifty, plus sentries,” Kolivan answered. “Before you ask, our estimates are five hundred prisoners of many species.”

“Wait, the prisoners outnumber guards ten to one? And they’re not fighting back?” Keith asked in disbelief. 

Kolivan met his gaze steadily. “There is nowhere for them to escape to.”

“They keep ships there, right? They’re transporting the ore out somehow. Why don’t they steal one of those, or something, anything?”

“The transports are heavily guarded and land only briefly.” Kolivan looked back at the paladins, his face as expressionless as usual. “Our hope is to free the prisoners and then destroy the mine. We believe this will slow the Empire’s production of weapons until they are able to find a new source of anglesium or a substitute. The prison is too heavily fortified for the Blade to act alone. If we could get a few Blades into the prison to disable the two stationary ion cannons outside the biodome, Voltron might be able to take out the rest of the defenses.”

Shiro cut in, his stomach dropping. “You need the Green Lion and Pidge to go in first.” 

Kolivan nodded. 

Shiro promised to give whichever paladin had let the secret slip about Green’s cloaking device a talking-to about divulging nonessential information. He turned to the smallest member of the team. “Pidge, it’s your call.”

Hearing her name seemed to break her out of her paralysis. She started and glanced at Shiro. He knew her answer before she spoke, of course. It was a mission to free prisoners of the Galra Empire – she would never say no.

Instead, she grinned and adjusted her glasses. “They literally won’t see what hit them.”

Small, but fierce, Shiro reminded himself. 

So Shiro had nodded, glancing at the others, who looked as resolute as Pidge. “All right. Pidge and the Green Lion will sneak close enough to the camp that she can drop you and other members of the Blade to disable the cannons. Once those are down, the rest of us will come in. We’ll take whatever firepower they’ve got left. Then we’ll join the Blade to neutralize the rest of the guards.” 

Allura had pursed her lips, looking worried but determined. “I’ll set us a course.” 

As everyone disbanded, doing whatever they did to keep calm in that strange liminal time between knowing the next mission and starting it, Keith had hung back, catching Shiro’s arm and pulling him aside. “You’ll take command?” he asked quietly. 

Shiro paused, hesitant as always as they navigated this odd space. “Not if you want to,” he said finally, only half-satisfied with the words. 

Keith grimaced. Even as Shiro recognized that hadn’t been what Keith wanted to hear, part of him wondered unhappily what more Keith wanted from him – he was doing his best to respect everything Keith had done to lead the team…before. But apparently, he thought bitterly, not enough. 

“You should do it. You’re in the Black Lion, after all,” Keith had answered finally, his smile shaky. 

Shiro had shrugged, trying to seem casual. “It shouldn’t even be much of a mission. If Kolivan’s right and all he needs is to get a few Blades inside, the plan should work fine.”

But, of course, Shiro thought ruefully, it hadn’t gone the way they’d planned.

They’d underestimated the number of guards at the edge of the prison, the point where Kolivan was leading his team in, and the three members of the Blade – including Kolivan – had been overwhelmed. When one of them snarled in pain, Pidge broke.

“Shiro, I’m going in—”

“Pidge, _no!”_ He fought the rising panic as he heard metal moving in the background. 

“I’m already in the speeder – just stick with the plan, we can make it work – we’ll disable the ion cannons and you take the rest.” 

_“Pidge!”_

“Hey, ugly!” she yelled, before the bzzt of her bayard traveled across the comms line.

It was too late. So Shiro waited in the hangar, reminding himself to breathe and not think about what would happen if Pidge’s panting turned into a gasp of pain or a scream, or worse, if she went completely silent. 

Then, suddenly, after a massive heave, the line stilled.

“Pidge!” That was Hunk – Shiro was amazed Hunk had kept quiet until now. “Pidge, are you there? Are you okay?”

They heard a quiet, “Oh no,” and heavy, wet gasps. 

“Pidge!” Lance called, barely keeping the panic from his voice. “Pidge, just tell us you’re okay, all right?”

Shiro had his hands on Black’s controls and was fishing for the button to open the hangar. Screw the mission, screw the cannons, if Pidge was in trouble—

But it was Keith who got through to her, his voice calm and yet commanding in a way Shiro had only heard in the last few weeks. “Pidge. Pidge, I need you to take a breath for me. Nice and slow. Green’s right there, she needs you to take a slow breath for her. Come on, inhale—”

They heard a long, stuttering breath over the line. “Right. I’m not hurt. It’s just—never mind. We’ll get the cannons. Give us five minutes.”

“How many doboshes is that?” Allura muttered, probably to Coran. 

“About ten, Allura,” Lance answered, his own voice shaky. “I’m holding you to that, Pidge. I’m setting a timer.”

They heard a quiet murmur over the comms line. “Kolivan says, when you land avoid the side of the prison closest to the mountain.” Pidge’s voice was unsteady.

“Okay, Pidge,” Shiro answered. “Just let us know when we can come in.” His hand tingled – why? Oh – he was still clutching the controls. He relaxed his fingers. 

They all spent the next several minutes in silence, straining to catch any information from whatever overheard snippets of conversation and noise came across the comms line. After what felt like an eternity, Pidge called, “Okay, cannons are down – they haven’t figured out we’re here yet, but they will soon. Be ready.”

“Good work, Pidge.” Shiro couldn’t keep from smiling in relief – they could always count on Pidge. “All right, team – let’s go!” 

He sank into the familiarity of his connection with Black, and then gave in to a rush of adrenaline as she obliged his request to leave the hangar. As he and the other lions came around the satellite to descend to the planet, took a breath to steady himself – focus on the mission. Free the prisoners. Destroy the mine. Protect his team. 

The muffled sound of an alarm blared over the comms line. “Sounds like they figured out you’re there,” Lance commented, failing to keep the energy from his voice. Shiro could picture Lance’s self-assured grin, his body bent over the control panel, excitement keeping him livewire-tense. 

Again the sound of Pidge’s bayard crackling. “Gee Lance, what tipped you off? Shiro, it looks like they’re launching fighters, so keep an eye out.”

“Good, we need some target practice,” Keith answered. If Lance was cocky going into a fight, Keith was positively predatory. “Here they come – Hunk, coming your way!”

“Why do they always come after me?” Shiro didn’t need the monitors to tell him Hunk had fired up his laser. “Can I get a little help here, guys? I’ve just got the one laser!”

Shiro veered to the left and struck one of the fighters with his jaw blade, swerving around Hunk’s laser to hit a second. 

Hunk inhaled sharply. “Shiro, I didn’t mean help like that! Dude, I could have hit you!”

Shiro brushed him off. “Don’t worry Hunk, I had it.”

Shiro thought he heard Hunk mutter something about “hotshot pilots”, but couldn’t quite make it out. And he had other things to worry about – like the fighter on his tail. He wove back and forth, avoiding the blasts. “Wanna try something, girl?” he murmured, pushing his idea across their connection. Black purred. “Thought so.” He pulled back on the joystick, maneuvering Black into a backflip that landed them behind the fighter, and fired his laser. 

_“Nice_ flying, Shiro!” Lance crowed, only to jerk Blue to the side abruptly to avoid a blast from the supposedly-dead ion cannon. “What the – Pidge, I thought you said you disabled the cannon!”

“We – did!” Pidge huffed over the comms line. “They must have – sent someone out – to fix it!” A resounding _thwack!_ echoed in their helmets. “There are way more than fifty guards here, guys. They keep coming!” 

“Hang on, Pidge, we’ll be there soon!” That was Keith. “How do we take out the cannon?”

“It looks like they can’t reposition it really fast – it’s like those old telescopes where you have to sight it,” Lance said.

“ _Oh,_ I gotcha, buddy!” Hunk cried. “Lance, Keith, can you keep it distracted for a few minutes?”

“Whatever you need, big man!” Shiro wasn’t sure exactly when Keith had started calling Hunk “big man” – it was just one of the dozens of tiny things that had changed in his absence. The Yellow Lion started climbing into the atmosphere, as if he were retreating. “Shiro, can you take the rest of the fighters?” 

His scanners showed five. “Sure.” He started thinking through ways to drag them off his teams’ tails as Keith and Lance took turns coming at the ion cannon from the same side and pulling back quickly, each following path with little variation but quickly enough the cannon couldn’t quite catch them. It was a trick that wasn’t going to work for long, but could be all right for a little while. He lost track of the Yellow Lion as he grabbed one fighter in his jaws and flung it into another, then ripped a third apart with his jaw blade. 

He had just dodged to make the last two crash into each other when he heard Hunk roar, _“Cowabunga!”_ A booming impact shuddered through the ground and make the comms line squeal for half a second. 

“Dude.” Lance’s voice was full of awe. “Did you just _belly flop the ion cannon?”_

The Yellow Lion picked itself up almost daintily. “What, that’s not what you had in mind?” Hunk asked. 

“I dunno, I just meant have one of us distract it and someone shoot it from the other side, but…Hunk, buddy. So many style points.”

Shiro gave himself a second to laugh. “All right, team. Pidge, what’s the status on the ground?”

“We could use some help here! There are entrances on the east and west sides. One of the ion cannons is close to one.”

“I see it!” Lance answered. “Hunk didn’t squish it, so that’s some luck.”

“I’ll have you know my belly flop was carefully calibrated to hit the cannon and _only_ the cannon.”

“Guys!” They could have this argument later. “People need our help! Let’s get down there, and keep your helmets down!”

“Paladins,” Allura cut in over the comms line, “If you could remember to drop the BLIP tech I gave you, it will help us ensure the prison is empty before it’s destroyed.” 

“Thanks for the reminder, Allura.” Shiro heard a series of metallic thuds as Lance exited the Blue Lion. “Time to be the heroes!”

**

Keith hadn’t gotten a good look at the prison until they were almost on top of it – a yellow haze, too thin for clouds and too thick to be ignored, hung over everything on this planet. So he took a second before landing to do a flyover and get a better idea of what they were facing, listening absently to Lance and Hunk’s excitement over the belly flop with a grin on his face. Dull metal walls surrounded an enormous area, and a gray material rounded over the whole thing like a puffy quilt. There was a comparatively small hangar to the side of the place – that must have been where the fighters were kept. A short tunnel extended from one point in the wall near the now-pancaked ion cannon. 

Aside from that, the place was almost featureless – no, that was wrong. On the west side, there were mountains in the distance, and another tunnel-like entrance from the wall. And something else – Keith nudged Red down for a closer look, and when he saw the shreds of purple and gray fabric that all the Galra prisoners seemed to wear, he wished he hadn’t. 

His stomach heaved and he looked away. That must have been what stopped Pidge in her tracks, if they came in on the west side. 

“Guys!” They could have this argument later. “Pidge and Kolivan need our help! Let’s get down there, and keep your helmets down!”

Right – focus on the mission. Keith landed Red gently next to the Black Lion, doing his best to concentrate on the controls, Red’s reassuring presence in the back of his mind, anything else. He checked the distance to the tunnel -- not far enough to make it worth using the speeder. “You gonna let me out?” Red listened, with a touch of reluctance (as always, since he’d briefly left to pilot the Black Lion). His chair rolled back from the controls and he hopped out through his lion’s mouth, joining the other paladins on the ground and getting a mouthful of noxious air that burned his throat. As soon as he started coughing, Shiro snapped, “Keith! Get your helmet on!”

Hunk held Keith up under his arms as the red paladin bent double, trying to cough the burning air out of his lungs and activate his helmet at the same time. “Sorry,” he croaked. Shiro’s face was equal parts annoyance and worry. Not for the first time, Keith wished there was a way to have a private conversation over the comms line – he’d give anything to keep Shiro away from that west entrance, but didn’t know how to say it in front of everyone. And even if he told Shiro not to do something, odds were five to one Shiro would do it anyway.

The whole interaction had taken less than a minute, but Keith knew it was too long for Shiro. “Let’s get moving,” Shiro said, not waiting for them as he took off toward the entrance. 

“How are we even gonna get in?” Hunk called, trying to keep up. 

Lance snorted. “Our buddy Galra Keith is helping us out.” By the time Lance, Hunk, and Keith made it to the entrance, Shiro was already there, bayard in hand and ready to fight whatever was on the other side of the door. It was still an odd sight to Keith’s eyes – strange as it seemed, he’d gotten used to the purple glowing alien technology hand. After glancing around and seeing the other paladins were ready, too, Keith pressed his hand to the key pad, then braced himself and raised his sword.

The tunnel was empty, and as soon as they were inside the door slid shut behind them. “That’s ominous,” Lance muttered.

“It’s just to keep the air out,” Shiro answered. “Kolivan said it was toxic to Galra too, remember?”

Sure enough the door at the other end of the tunnel opened a few seconds later. Shiro set a fast pace that the others struggled to keep up with. They barely made it through the other door before it closed, but they made it. Keith had just a few seconds to take in his surroundings – too-bright lights high up, small metal huts scattered around, two larger and better-constructed buildings on his left, and beyond that a cliff – no, that must be the mine – before a Galra guard was coming at him. Keith dodged the guard’s blaster and hurled his weight against his opponent before taking down a second guard with his sword. It sounded like the other paladins were doing the same, and it didn’t take as long as he expected to clear the open space. 

“Pidge, where are you?” Shiro asked, sheathing his bayard. 

“In the main building, the smaller one – it’s the command center. We’re not sure what’s in the bigger one. There’s about ten guards left here, not sure how many in the other building.”

“Hunk and I are on our way.” Shiro was already turning toward the building she’d indicated. “Keith, Lance – check that building over there!” Shiro gestured at the larger building, the only other one that didn’t look like a hovel. None of them hesitated to follow Shiro’s orders – Lance and Hunk didn’t even glance at Keith in search of agreement. For Keith, it was a relief; things were almost back to normal. 

The first floors of the building Keith and Lance searched went fast – some kind of administrative office, supply rooms (not even good supplies, unfortunately), and a medical room that gave Keith the shivers, all abandoned in the chaos. It wasn’t long before he and Lance were at the top floor, a long hallway with doors lining either side.

“I said it once and I’ll say it again – this seems ominous.” Lance shouldered his rifle more securely.

Keith rolled his eyes. “You’re really proud of yourself for learning that word, aren’t you?” Even as Keith teased Lance, he was readying his own bayard. 

“It’s a faster way to say ‘this gives me the heebie-jeebies. What’s not to like? See if you can open any of the doors, Mullet.”

“Make sure you check _every_ room! We don’t want to leave anyone behind.” Shiro’s voice over the comms was insistent.

Lance jerked his head at the first door. “You heard the man in charge. Let’s get going.”

Keith pressed his hand to the reader, revealing a small, windowless cell. “Empty.”

Lance shrugged. “Next one, then.”

They were halfway down the hallway before they found a cell with an occupant. “Hello? Hey, you awake?” Lance called. The creature on the floor – an insect-like thing about Pidge’s size – only gasped.

“Whoa, hey, hey, it’s okay, we’ll get you out,” Lance said, rushing to help them sit up. He turned to Keith, expression worried. “I don’t think they can get back on their own.”

After a moment’s hesitation, Keith nodded. “You take them back. I’ll check the other cells.”

“You sure?”

“Yeah, I’ll be fine, just get them out of here.” Lance shrugged one of the alien’s arms around his shoulders and braced them. “Okay, can you walk at all? Let’s go – we’ll go slow, okay?” They disappeared down the hallway. After watching them go, Keith continued down the hall, finding lines of empty cells. He thought he would almost rather have found them full – this seemed too strange. Who would build a prison within a prison? Still, he opened door after door on empty rooms -- until he came to the last one. 

Like the last occupied cell, this was darker than the empty cells, without a hint of light inside. In the eerie purple light from the hall he could barely see the outline of a creature moving in the farthest corner a few feet away. Their height (or lack of it) made clear they weren’t Galra, and they looked humanoid. 

“Is someone there?”

A croaking voice answered, “Stay away.”

“Hold on, I won’t hurt you, I’m getting some light.” He concentrated on making his bayard glow ( _that_ had been a useful skill to discover), revealing that the room was empty, but for the creature that crouched defensively in the far corner. “Look, I’m Keith, I’m a paladin of Voltron, we’re here to get you out.”

A pause. “You’re not Galra?” 

Oh for—he didn’t have time to explain. “We’re fighting Zarkon. Did you notice all the big noises? That was us. Come on, let’s get you out of here.”

The creature stepped forward into the light. They were a humanoid she, about his height, barefoot and wearing a ragged tunic top and leggings, the same as what all the prisoners seemed to wear. It was impossible to tell what color her hair was under the filth, but it was pulled away from her face. Keith stiffened when he noticed her ears. Small, round ears. 

He was very, _very_ glad Shiro was in command at that moment.

“Okay,” he said quietly. “Let’s go.”

**

He walked her out into the strange, harsh light of the courtyard, trying to ignore the chatter over the comms line. He did register when someone said something about BLIP tech readings from the west entrance and Pidge relayed that Kolivan said the Blade would handle it, letting Keith relax a little – Shiro could stay away from the west entrance after all.

He took a moment to survey the open space and plan his next step. Lance and Hunk were herding the remaining prisoners through the tunnel in small groups, while Pidge brought the remaining fighter pods as close as she could to the entrance in an effort to spare their lungs…or gills…or whatever. The Blade of Marmora guarded the remaining Galra soldiers. The woman walking next to him kept her eyes on the ground. A prisoner who appeared to have taken charge was clasping a helmetless Shiro’s hand gratefully when Keith approached. 

“We can’t thank you enough for what you’ve done,” the prisoner was saying as Keith and the woman came into earshot, coming up behind Shiro.

“Good luck traveling to your home worlds,” Shiro responded simply, looking uncomfortable with the gratitude. 

Keith put a hand on the woman’s back and guided her forward. She flinched and stumbled as Keith grabbed her arm to keep her from falling. Giving her a once-over to make sure she was steady, he leaned in close to Shiro. “Shiro,” he said quietly, catching Shiro’s eye, “there’s something you should see.” He gave a significant look toward the woman next to him. She was looking at the ground again, curled in on herself like she expected the worst.

Shiro turned and followed Keith’s gaze. 

Even when faced with the most humanoid aliens, there was something viscerally unfamiliar about them, something that deep in his bones told Shiro a creature was _not human._ He’d credit his time as a captive for it, but he knew the other paladins, except Keith, had developed (or discovered) the same instinct. It wasn’t bad or uncomfortable after so much time in space – it just was. Shiro had become so used to it that he’d forgotten how it felt to meet someone and _not_ feel that nagging otherness. And so it took Shiro a moment to realize why looking at the being standing in front of him was making warning bells go off in his brain. 

She was human. 

He froze for a moment, a million possibilities and questions running through his brain. He took a breath –patience. Patience yields focus. They would have time for questions later. For that moment, the priority was to clear out and destroy the prison. Schooling his features into a smile, Shiro extended a hand. “And here we thought we were the only earthlings in this corner of the universe. I’m Shiro.”

She glanced at his face, then at the Galra tech hand he’d extended, and recoiled, her mouth twisting in a grimace. She didn’t shake his hand. “Rose.”

Shiro dropped his hand, her rejection hardening in his stomach like a bad meal. “Well. I bet you’ve got a story for us, Rose.”

**

“A human?” Allura exclaimed over the comms system. “But I thought the Kerberos mission was the farthest reaching space exploration your species had embarked on!” 

“So did we!” Lance responded. He and the other paladins were standing apart from the prisoners while a member of the Blade kept a hand on Rose’s shoulder. “What do we do with her? It’s not like we can send her home!”

“Well, we _could,”_ Hunk interjected. “It would just require stealing one of those Galra shuttles, creating a wormhole, sending her through to our solar system, letting her pilot her way back to Earth, hoping the shuttle makes it through the atmosphere without exploding, and potentially dropping her right into the hands of whatever conspiracy theory secret shadow government we rescued Shiro from.” The other paladins could practically see him tallying up the obstacles in the air above his head as he ticked them off on his fingers. “So, maybe not a great idea.”

“She comes with us.” Pidge’s voice was determined.

“Is that safe?” Keith asked. “We haven’t had great luck with letting people on the ship lately.”

Shiro wondered (yet again) what had happened while he’d been gone that they hadn’t mentioned to him.

“What would you do with her, Keith? Leave her here?” Pidge asked angrily. 

“That’s not what he’s saying, Pidge,” Hunk interjected. “He’s just saying we should be careful.” 

Keith looked to Shiro, clearly hoping for backup. Shiro was torn – part of him agreed with Keith and Hunk, they’d had bad experiences before. But Pidge was right; they couldn’t leave her in the middle of nowhere by herself. After a moment, he answered, “We should find out if she knows anything useful. And how she got here, and whether there are any other humans with her. For now, we’ll take her with the injured prisoners. We can put her in a cryopod if we have to.” 

Keith opened his mouth to argue, but instead locked eyes with Shiro. Shiro thought briefly they knew each other too well – he knew what it meant when Keith turned his head and set his jaw that way, just as Keith knew what it meant when Shiro raised his eyebrows to exactly that height. Then again, they avoided an entire argument as Shiro silently communicated he wouldn’t budge on this, and Keith dropped his shoulders with a meaningful gaze – one Shiro knew meant “we’re talking about this later.”

“Well, that might not quite work, Shiro. Y’see, we’ve already filled the pods. So she might be out of luck for a bit,” Coran said, on the castleship and oblivious to the whole exchange between Keith and Shiro (though the other paladins certainly weren’t). 

“She doesn’t look like she needs healing,” Keith muttered.

“Are you crazy, Keith? She’s skin and bones! She probably hasn’t had a real meal in months!” Lance was indignant, and, Shiro guessed, glad for the distraction from his and Keith’s silent altercation. 

“Well, one of you should get her on board this ship,” Allura said definitively. “We need to get out of here. If the Galra don’t know we’ve destroyed this prison already, they will soon.”

Shiro sighed. “You’re right, Princess. Hunk. Can you take her in the yellow lion?”

“Wait a minute, why does _Hunk_ get one-on-one time with the only human girl we’ve seen in a year? She can ride with me in Blue!”

“Oh, thanks, Lance,” Pidge said sarcastically. 

Keith rolled his eyes. “Shiro’s not cruel enough to make anyone ride with you, Lance.”

“Do I have to? Why not take her with you in the black lion?” Hunk asked anxiously.

Shiro glanced at his hand. “I’m staying around for a minute.” It wasn’t a lie if it was true, even if it wasn’t why he made the decision. “You’ll be fine, Hunk. And I know I can trust you not to spend the entire ride hitting on someone we just freed from a Galra prison.”

“Ouch, dude,” Lance muttered. 

“Paladins, would you mind having this squabble once we’re back on the ship? I would like to clear this system before Zarkon sends a fleet to destroy us.” That was Allura’s tetchy voice, which was about three disobeyed or delayed orders away from her imperiously enraged voice. Shiro winced. 

“She’s right. Let’s get going, team!”

Hunk led Rose away from the Blade and toward tunnel. Shiro double-checked – yes, all the beings in prisoner garb were gone. He took off his helmet, deactivating his comms line and dreading what he knew was coming. He made his way over to Kolivan, who was surveying the edge of the mine itself with a distasteful expression. 

“What do we do with the guards?” he asked. He glanced back to make sure the other paladins followed Hunk to the tunnel, then looked at the restrained Galra nearby.

Kolivan didn’t look away from the mine, nor did his look of disgust change. “Leave them to the Blade.” 

Shiro steeled himself. “What are you planning to do with them?” 

As always, Kolivan’s voice was level. “Find out what they know.”

Something about the evenness in Kolivan’s voice made Shiro’s skin crawl. “Knowledge or death, right? Or is it both in this case?” Shiro asked harshly. 

“Do you truly plan to fight the Blade for the lives of the same guards who put you into the gladiator arena?” Kolivan asked. 

“I’m not going to leave them to die.” They might be allies, but meeting Kolivan’s eyes – hard, yellow,  
and so much like ones he barely remembered except in nightmares – still made Shiro’s stomach heave. He did it anyway. 

Kolivan looked away first, eying the guards. “Zarkon’s empire might not abide by our ancient laws, but we of the Blade do not forget the traditions our ancestors laid down.”

“That’s not an answer to my question.” Shiro’s skin started to fizz with anger. He glanced down – his prosthetic was glowing a dim purple. 

Breathe. Patience yields focus. Shiro calmed, and the glow died. 

Kolivan’s gaze flickered up – he’d seen Shiro’s reaction as well. After a moment, he added, “We will give them a chance to redeem themselves honorably. If they refuse it, they will die without disgrace.” When Shiro didn’t respond, Kolivan asked, “Would you fight me on this, Paladin? You are skilled, but I would beat you.”

Shiro paused. “I wouldn’t need to beat you. I have Voltron.” 

“Do you? Would your fellow paladins take your side for a band of Galran murderers?” Shiro hesitated – it hadn’t been that long ago he believe all of his paladins would follow him without question, even if that hadn’t been what he’d wanted. But these days, he wasn’t sure. He didn’t think he could win this fight, verbal or physical – the guards were going with the Blade. Not that Shiro knew what to do with them either. So he changed the subject.

“What did you find when you investigated the BLIP tech readings by the west entrance?”

Kolivan grimaced. “A few living prisoners. Not many. Lidur has taken them to your castleship for treatment, as Coran suggested.” After a moment he added, “When we first arrived, we found the remains of many prisoners. I am concerned for Pidge. I fear it disturbed her.”

Shiro wasn’t sure if it was the fact that Pidge was so much smaller than them that made Kolivan and the rest of the Blade weirdly protective of her, or it was the fact that she was a girl (they still hadn’t seen any female Galra, to his knowledge). But for some reason, while they had started to respect Keith, tolerated Lance, and seemed to get along with Hunk, they’d taken an almost instant liking to Pidge. Shiro couldn’t blame them – he’d done the same thing, after all. 

“I’ll check in with her. Are you coming with us?” he asked, but Kolivan shook his head. 

“Lidur has retrieved our ship from the castle. He will meet me here and we will return to our headquarters with the prisoners.” 

Shiro nodded, a little relieved. After a moment, Kolivan added, “Thank you. We would not have been able to accomplish what we did today without your help.” He reached out his hand. Shiro shook it.

“You know how to contact us if you need us.” 

The other Blades started moving the guards toward the entrance, and Kolivan followed. Shiro replaced his helmet. “Keith, Lance, did you find any good supplies we can use in that building?”

“Nothing useful,” Lance answered. “Too bad – I could use a change from space goo. Hunk did get a couple smaller pieces of equipment to play with. We’re all in the Lions, Shiro. Hunk took off already, but the rest of us are waiting for you.

Shiro glanced around. “I think this place is mostly empty.” He watched as Kolivan and the Blade escorted the surviving guards (were there really so few?) to their pod. When everyone else had left, he took one last glance at the strange purple lights and the desolate space and jogged back to Black’s comforting familiarity. “I’m okay, girl,” he murmured fondly, feeling her concern as he settled back into the cockpit. “But let’s get out of here fast, okay?” Black purred, and it felt like a moment before he joined the other paladins in the air.

“Princess, any readings from the BLIP tech?” Shiro asked.

“None. The prison is cleared out,” Allura answered. Shiro’s lips twitched – good. 

“Keith, you want to do the honors?”

“Yes, sir,” Keith answered as the Red Lion’s plasma cannon materialized – he hadn’t even waited for Shiro’s request. “Good riddance,” he muttered, watching the prison burn.

It didn’t take long for Shiro to be convinced the mine was no longer usable. “Good work, team. Let’s head back.” The others took off, but Shiro hesitated for a moment. 

He wasn’t sure why, but something wasn’t right. 

After a moment, he convinced himself that whatever it was, it could wait.


	3. Chapter 2

It was an unspoken rule that Allura and Coran gave the paladins some time to themselves after a mission, as long as there were no emergencies demanding their attention. Shiro figured the others would be in the lounge, and he was right. Keith was chugging water before pouring the remainder over his head. Lance had collapsed on the couch, while Hunk and Pidge were looking at something on Pidge’s computer, though their hearts didn’t seem to be in it. 

Usually after a successful mission just stepping into the lounge let Shiro’s shoulders relax a little – the space was welcoming, they were all safe, and they had a few minutes to laugh over whatever antics they’d pulled and appreciate the win. Today, though, there was a tension in the air he didn’t like – everyone seemed to be waiting for something. But Shiro supposed that was to be expected.

“Where are the prisoners?” he asked, then winced at his phrasing. “The prisoners we rescued, I mean.”

Hunk glanced up from the computer. “They’re all in the infirmary. Coran met me in Yellow’s hanger and took Rose down there.” Of course Hunk would guess what had been on Shiro’s mind.

“Did she say anything on the ride over?”

Hunk shook his head. “Nothing.”

Shiro nodded, and took a deep breath before addressing the source of the unspoken tension. “All right. Look, team, this is no different from any other rescue situation we’ve been through.”

Pidge frowned, putting her computer aside. “But it’s not, Shiro. She’s one of ours. And somehow she’s out here.”

“We don’t know anything about this situation and we can’t assume anything,” Shiro responded.

“Shiro.” That was Lance, and Shiro looked over to find the blue paladin’s face fraught with worry.

“Do you think this means…the Galra made it to Earth? Do you think—”

“Like Shiro said, we can’t assume anything, Lance,” Keith cut in. He sounded uncertain, but the gentleness in his tone surprised Shiro. Another part of his mind marked it down as one more mystery he’d come back to.

Hunk shifted to wrap an arm around Lance’s shoulders. “If the Galra invaded Earth, buddy, we’d probably have seen a lot more humans today, right?”

Lanced nodded tentatively. “Right. You’re probably right.” Shiro thought he still looked worried.   
Pidge moved over and sat on Lance’s other side, carrying her laptop. “The other day I found a bunch of cat videos I forgot I saved on my laptop. Wanna watch some little shits knock water glasses over?”

Lance laughed weakly. “I can’t say no to cats.”

Keith walked around to lean on the back of the couch where he could see. “If anyone makes any jokes about me being a grumpy cat I’m leaving.”

Hunk glanced up at Shiro, grinning. “Staying for cat videos?” He looked hopeful enough that part of Shiro wanted to say yes, but still…he had work to do.

He shook his head. “I’ll see you all at dinner, I think. I’ll check on Coran and the rescues.”

Hunk deflated, and Shiro thought he glimpsed a look between Hunk and Keith. But then Hunk shrugged, and said, “Okay, man, see you later,” and Shiro left as the sounds of mewing and laughter started behind him. 

**

The doors to the infirmary opened as he paused in front of them. He glanced at the cryopods – all were full, but none held a human. In some pods, the cloudy gas blocked his view of whatever creature was inside; Coran had explained to him once that the pods recalibrated based on the needs of whatever species was inside, and it was pure chance that the pods were clear for humans. Pidge had asked what felt like a thousand follow-up questions, but Shiro had stopped listening long before the conversation ended. 

Coran was tidying up a pull-out shelf (normally hidden by wall panels) with his back to the door, and turned briefly when he heard the whisper of the doors opening, then went back to his task. “Looking for the human you paladins rescued? Allura’s taken her off to get cleaned up.”

“So Rose is definitely human then?” Shiro asked, briefly wondering if the creature in one of the pods was as huge as its shadow behind the gas suggested. 

“Completely human genome. Not a speck of alien in her.”

Shiro stopped at the shelf, looking at what was laid out in front of him. Scissors, medical thread, a number of balms, and a scalpel. Next to those was a bundle of dirty, ragged bandages, covered with rusty brown stains, and a few towels marked with what looked like filth and fresh blood. Shiro had seen the pods in action enough to know that Coran wouldn’t bother with stitches for someone going straight into a cryopod – the supplies must have been for Rose, then.   
“Was she hurt badly?”

Coran shrugged, his eyes still on the table and the supplies he was cleaning with some kind of acrid-smelling blue gel. “A few stitches and a bit of an infection. Rather malnourished. She’d do better in one of the cryopods, but all those in them now are more gravely wounded than she was and need them more.” Coran’s voice was as brisk as always, but to Shiro’s ear seemed to be missing its usual spark.

“Are you all right, Coran? You seem—subdued.”

The Altean sighed, put down the instrument he was wiping off, and leaned heavily on the table. “Sometimes we get harsh reminders of how cruel Zarkon’s empire is. Today was one of those times.” He glanced around the room. “All of these beings were left for dead from injury or illness. We’re lucky we found them when we did, and that we have the resources to save them.” He looked sidelong at Shiro. “Your human woman – Rose, you said?—she was beaten many times. The most recent time was just a quintant or two ago.” He gestured at the supplies as explanation. “She’ll have the scars for the rest of her life. No amount of time in a cryopod will fix that.”

Shiro didn’t want to think about that – it was bad enough when they found non-humans in captivity. “Did she say anything to you? About how she got here, whether she was alone?”

“Not a word the entire time. Hardly a whimper, either. I finished stitching her up and Allura offered to help her wash up. She just nodded.”

Shiro rested a hand on the Altean’s shoulder briefly, trying to be reassuring. “Thanks, Coran. This was a hard day for all of us.”

Coran gave him a tired smile. “It was indeed, but we can sleep knowing we’ve done good work today, and saved many innocent lives. You paladins did well. You especially, Shiro. I know this can’t be easy for you.”

Shiro shifted, a little awkward at the praise and Coran’s not-so-subtle allusion to his own history with the Empire. “Washing up sounds like a good plan. I’ll see you at dinner.”

When he was halfway to the door, he heard Coran call out, “Do all humans have pictographic markings?”

Shiro stopped, confused. “What?”

“You know, pictographs. Pictures.”

He tried to keep himself from rolling his eyes – couldn’t this wait? “I know what a pictograph is, Coran.” 

“Then do all humans have pictographs on their skin? I’ve never noticed them on you paladins, but I do admit my experience has been limited by clothing.”

Shiro breathed a mental sigh of relief for that. “I don’t think so – some of us have birthmarks, or freckles—”

“No no, we Alteans recognize birthmarks and freckles. Why, I’ve got one on my left buttock that looks like the profile of Queen Abystha the Fourth, but it’s just a brown splotch really. This was more…colorful. Like flowers.”

Realization dawned, which mercifully let Shiro stop contemplating Coran’s left buttock. “Oh. A tattoo. No, not all humans have them. They choose to get them – they’re like permanent ink drawings.”

“Ah. Well. Your human woman has a rather impressive one on her side, then. Big red and yellow flowers with thorns.”

Shiro shook his head – a woman named Rose with a rose tattoo. He wondered briefly about whether she’d been in her right mind when she made that decision – but he’d made enough questionable decisions himself that it probably wasn’t his place to judge, even if none of them had resulted in tattoos. “See you at dinner, Coran.”

**

Allura had dealt with dozens of diplomatic crises in her lifetime. She’d negotiated the Trans-Hupali Peace when she was fifteen years old and Alfor had been delirious with Zerythian fever, after all. She’d been thrust into war with Zarkon when she was barely an adult, and woke up to find ten thousand years had passed and the fate of the universe rested with her and five young humans – but, well, she trusted the Ancients and they surely knew what they were doing.

But she had never been faced with quite this situation – being comforting and personable was never her strongest trait. She left that to Coran. So Allura had decided the best thing to do when faced with a clearly traumatized refugee who may or may not have some connection to her Paladins was to be as cheerful as possible, even if it wasn’t something she was naturally good at. She remembered all too clearly what it had felt like to find out her home was gone, and while this human woman’s home world still existed, she was far away from it with no hope of returning in the near future. So she’d decided she would show Rose the most comforting face she could and chatter to cover her own awkwardness.

“Now then, we’ll get you all cleaned up in a nice warm shower, and get you into some comfy clothes before dinner. Hunk can do some wonderful things with granulaf, but we’ll probably have to make do with just yapurik for tonight.” Allura handed Rose a bathrobe and a towel. “Off you go. There’s soap and such in there already. I’ll wait here.”

Rose obeyed, not meeting Allura’s eyes and looking as confused as Allura felt. As soon as the woman was out of sight in the shower Allura sighed and sank down against the wall. What a long quintant. And somehow it wasn’t over yet. 

She dozed a bit, then checked her ticker. The mice had found her and were napping at her side. The woman had been in the wash room quite a while, but the shower didn’t sound like it was running. Allura waited a little longer before deciding it would be prudent to check. “Hello?” she called, standing up. One of the mice squeaked until Allura bent down to pick them up and place them on her shoulders. “Are you all right in there? I’m coming in.” 

The woman was standing by the sink, wrapped in the bathrobe. She’d found a comb and was determinedly picking at the mess of wet, matted hair she’d let down. She wasn’t getting very far. At the sound of the door, the woman called Rose turned. Allura noticed her eyes were red, but she didn’t appear to be crying at the moment. They stared at each other awkwardly, but Rose broke first, looking at the ground. “At this point it would probably be easier to cut it all off. It’ll take forever to untangle.” Her voice was croaky and raw. 

It was the first time Allura had heard her speak. She paused. “Is that what you want?”

Rose bit her lip and shook her head. 

Allura glanced at the mice and pulled over a chair. “Then why don’t you sit down and let us help.” After a moment’s hesitation, Rose nodded and sat, only flinching a little as Chulatt scampered onto her shoulder.

**

“Hunk, can we _please_ eat? I’m so hungry!” Pidge rolled her eyes as Lance complained yet again. 

“It’s rude not to wait for a guest, Lance,” Hunk retorted, his voice making it clear he was accepting no argument. 

Lance argued anyway.

“We saved an entire prison today! And they’re taking forever, and I’m _starving_. Shiro, c’mon, the food’s just sitting here!”

“We’ll give them a few more minutes, Lance.”

“Look who’s here!” Allura’s conspicuous cheerfulness proceeded her and the human woman into the dining room. “All healed and cleaned up!”

Shiro looked up and noted that Rose did look very different from earlier that day. Allura had found a loose-fitting shirt and pants in bright colors for the woman, and her hair – medium brown, it turned out, with gray at the roots -- had been untangled and smoothed into a long braid. Though her white skin seemed almost gray and unnaturally pale, she at least was clean of whatever filth she’d picked up in the prison. She still looked exhausted and nervous, and kept her eyes on the ground, but it was certainly an improvement. 

“Hey, look at you!” Hunk said with a smile. “Why don’t you sit down and let me get you a plate—”  
She stopped, barely in the door. “No.” She cleared her throat and swallowed. “No, thank you, I mean.” 

Hunk looked crushed. Keith looked at Rose with an annoyed expression, while Lance looked on in disbelief. 

She glanced up and seemed to realize her words were having an effect. “I – I don’t mean to be rude. It smells wonderful. But I’ve been on prison rations for a while, and I think I’ll need some time to adjust to normal food again.” Even as she spoke, she looked longingly at the bowls of space goo placed on the table.

“Why don’t I take the young miss into the kitchen for some tea and klast bread while you paladins finish your meal?” Coran said, standing up and giving a little bow. “I think you’ll find klast is easy on your stomach, and knowing how these paladins eat we won’t be gone long.” After a second, Rose nodded and let him escort her through the doors to the kitchen.

Once they were out of sight Allura sank into a chair. “Well, that was smoothly done on our part.”

Hunk looked bewildered. “I didn’t even think about that. Why hasn’t that been a problem when we’ve rescued prisoners before?”

Allura sighed. “The cryopods are excellent at bringing a body’s metabolism back up to optimum speed. But we’re out of cryopods. She’s right. The yapurik would have probably made her extremely ill.”

Pidge looked at Shiro angrily. “You never said the Galra starved their prisoners.” It took Shiro only a moment to realize she was thinking of her family.

Shiro frowned, trying to remember what he could of his time in captivity. “I don’t remember that at all. I’m sorry, Pidge.”

“You were in the gladiator arena though. They might have fed you a little better than the working prisoners,” Keith said levelly. “You had entertainment value.”

Shiro looked at his friend, and knew him well enough to realize that in spite of his casual tone mentioning the conditions of Shiro’s imprisonment still infuriated him. “Entertainment value. Right.” He sighed. “Let’s eat.”

They made quick work of the food, barely saying a word to each other. Lance had been right when he’d said they were all hungry – so hungry even space goo tasted delicious. But Lance was looking at his plate, and not talking. They were all quiet, but Lance was unusually so. Keith was the first to notice.

“It’s almost a nice meal without you running your mouth off, Lance,” he said gruffly. 

“I shouldn’t have said I was starving.”

“It was just a figure of speech, buddy,” Hunk said reassuringly.

“I know, it’s just –”

“There are all sorts of problems people across the universe face every day. Your guilt isn’t going to do anything to help them,” Allura interrupted, her voice kinder than her words suggested. “Learn from your mistake and use your energy to make things better instead of feeling guilty for what you can’t change, Lance.”

At that moment Coran popped his head through the kitchen door. “All done in here? Wonderful, I’ve made us all some tea for after dinner. Help us all relax a little after a long quintant. Come on then, let’s bring the cups out.” Allura stifled at laugh at seeing that Coran had conscripted the bewildered Rose to carry eight oversized cups while he carried a container with a spigot. The scents that wafted out as he poured the tea and the paladins gathered up the plates were herby and green, but not unpleasant. 

The table cleared, they all sat down again with a cup of tea. Shiro hadn’t told anyone to stay, but they all did, silently waiting. 

Rose set her cup on the table without taking a sip. She paused briefly before speaking, eyes down. “I’m guessing you have questions.”

Everyone looked to Shiro. He was surprised – normally he expected Allura would want to be in charge in a situation like this. Shiro glanced at her, and she nodded slightly, seeming to give him permission to take the lead here. “Yes. Can you try to answer a few of them?” he asked. 

Rose shifted, still looking at the table. “I’ll do my best.” 

“Let’s start easy, then. Who are you?”

The woman took a deep breath. When she spoke, she rattled the information off like she was reciting something she’d learned by rote. “My name is Rose Vogel. I am – was – a xenobiologist on the Galaxy Garrison shuttle Anzu, mission codename Pytheas, under commanding officer and pilot Yabani Onwudiwe. Other crew were mechanic Zhuang Wei, medic Miguel Rodriguez Flores, and xenolinguist Rhys Chambers. Our mission was to travel to other star systems and record any existence of extra-terrestrial life.”

Shiro had started when he’d heard Owudiwe’s name. “Wait, Yabani On–” Shiro began, but Lance cut in before he could finish.

“Hold up, what? You were on a Garrison ship? That went beyond the solar system? To look for aliens?”

The woman nodded, seemingly unperturbed by Lance’s rapid-fire questions. “Yes.”

“That makes no sense!” Lance exclaimed. “How have we never heard about this? How did you travel that far?” He paused. _“How long have you been out here?”_

Rose looked up from the table for the first time and gave Lance a pitying look laced with disdain. “Do you _really_ think the government tells us everything it gets up to?” she asked, sounding for all the world like an adult asking a child if they honestly still believed in the tooth fairy.

Lance pursed his lips in a half-sulk. Keith and Pidge nodded at each other across the table, their suspicions confirmed. Shiro reminded himself not to roll his eyes.

“As for your other questions,” she continued, “I’m not sure how long I’ve been here. Our shuttle launched in June of twenty-one ten.”

“Earth time doesn’t have a whole lot of meaning out here, but it’s about November of twenty-one fourteen now,” Pidge said.

Rose considered. “So about four and a half years. That fits, I guess.” She paused. “You asked how we traveled so far. About twenty years ago, an empty UFO crashed in the desert in Texas. Since then the Garrison has had scientists reverse engineering the technology. A few years back they finally built a functioning ship. From the tech I think it must have been a Galra vessel.”

“So they sent you into space to float around and hoped you’d bump into aliens,” Hunk said. Rose nodded. “But that’s ridiculous – what about your families? What if you never came back?”

“All of us were from a special Garrison program for long-term space exploration. None of us were close to our families.” 

“ _None_ of you?” Lance asked incredulously. 

Her mouth tightened. “In retrospect I doubt that was an accident.” 

“How come none of us ever heard about this?” Shiro asked. “We all trained at the Garrison.”

Rose paused, as if absorbing that bit of information. “It was a top secret program. I’d be surprised if they would ever admit to it.” 

Lance’s eyes narrowed. “So you’re telling us there’s no way for us to make sure you’re telling the truth, and even if we somehow managed to beam an intergalactic communication to earth the people who sent you here would probably deny it?”

Rose nodded.

“That seems suspicious.”

She shrugged. “Yeah. I guess.”

“How do we know you’re actually telling the truth?”

She shrugged again, as if the idea of them not believing her story didn’t bother her much. “I guess you really can’t. I lost my Garrison gear years ago.” 

Shiro thought for a moment, then asked, “What happened after you launched?” 

Rose took a sip of tea before answering. Her hands were shaking slightly. “We made it out of the solar system fast. A few weeks. We set course for the Trappist-1 system. I'm guessing you’ve seen Galra space tech – it moves faster than lightspeed, but it still takes a while. We were travelling for about eighteen months, according to our systems, before a Galra cruiser found us.” She ran a thumb over the edge of her cup, not meeting anyone’s eyes. “I don’t remember what happened then, really. There was a blast, and I think I hit my head. When I woke up I was being held on the cruiser. Alone.” She was quiet for a long moment. 

In the silence, Pidge met Shiro’s gaze, looking confused and worried. 

“So your ship was captured by the Galra. What happened then?” Shiro prompted.

“I was sent to the prison where you found me almost immediately. I don’t know what happened to the others.” She paused again. Shiro wondered if she’d done much talking in the last few years, if her story was true. “I would be surprised if any of them were still alive.”

“But you managed to last this long,” Coran said gently.

Rose shook her head. “Only because they realized I was useful. It started when I helped some of the other prisoners when they were hurt.” Her mouth twisted again and Shiro noticed her knuckles were going white around her cup. “Like I said, I’m a xenobiologist, so I could figure out the basics at least, and that was better than nothing. The Galra didn’t mind that. It was only when prisoners who’d had tech implants started coming to me, and I started fixing them, that they started getting me to fix their gear malfunctions, and their biotech.” 

Shiro felt an instant wave of disgust as her words sunk in. Hunk and Lance both looked unsettled, and Keith shot Shiro an “I-told-you-so” look. 

“But why would you help them?” Allura asked, her expression horrified.

“I didn’t, at first.” Rose was silent briefly. “They were persuasive.”

“ _Persuasive?_ They were laying waste to the galaxy and you were fixing their…their armor and weapons!”

“Princess –” Coran interjected. He caught Shiro’s eyes, looking worried, and it clicked. 

“Was that when they beat you?” Shiro asked. The other paladins glanced at him in surprise. 

Rose paused before answering. “Yes.”

“Was that what made you give in?” 

She looked him straight on for the first time since that morning. “No.” Her eyes were hazel, he noticed, mostly brown with a little green. She didn’t look away, her jaw set defiantly, and he caught a hint of what might have convinced the Garrison commanders that she could handle an uncharted mission beyond the solar system. 

“What did?”

Lance winced a little. “Shiro, is this really necessary?”

“No, I understand,” Rose interrupted. She nodded at Shiro’s hand, wrapped around the mug Coran had given him. “You were in the gladiator arenas, yeah? The tech’s a giveaway.” After a moment, Shiro nodded. Rose considered, then continued. “Then I get how it’s hard to accept someone willingly fixing Galra Empire gear and weapons. I can understand why you wouldn’t trust me.” She put a slight emphasis on “you”, light enough that Shiro wondered if he’d imagined it – until he glanced at Allura and saw her frowning. 

He decided to ignore it. “So what did it take for you to help them?” he asked.

Rose paused, long enough that Shiro was about to prompt her to answer before she said, “They killed people when I said no.”

Hunk make a small whimpering sound, but no one else reacted. At least, until Allura crossed her arms, leaning back in her chair in a way that instantly set Shiro on edge.

“And why should that convince us to trust you?” she asked harshly. 

This time it was Lance who jumped in. “Allura, that’s not fair!”

The look Allura gave him was cold. “I’m sure they killed others with the repairs she made. Her work let them do more damage on a larger scale.” She glared at Rose. “Give us one good reason to trust you. Why shouldn’t we leave you somewhere for the Galra to find?”

“Princess,” Shiro started, but Rose met Allura’s glare with one of her own. 

“Because I started sabotaging the repairs.”

Shiro looked at her in surprise. “You what?”

“I figured I could sabotage one in sixteen repairs with an acceptable risk of getting caught,” she replied evenly, ignoring Shiro and still holding Allura’s gaze. “Prisons are considered relief duty, vacation, so there’s a constant flow of soldiers from all over the empire. I figured it would be hard to trace the malfunctions back to me. So I worked out a way to wreck one in sixteen repairs.”

“Wait. How could you keep them from tracing it to you?” Pidge asked.

Rose shrugged. “I flipped a coin, basically. I mean, it was a washer where I scratched one side up, but same principle. Four flips, etched side all four times meant I wrecked the next repair.” Her voice had slipped into a pattern like she was explaining a math problem – detached and patient. “I varied my techniques. I flipped the washer again to decide on tech or bio sabotage. I used everything I could – contamination, weakening fibers to break more quickly, using faulty parts. I tried to keep from doing the same thing too often, and I never used the same technique on the same limb twice. Not truly random, but close enough. Galra don’t really seem to have a good grasp on probability anyway.” She looked back to Allura. “Does that satisfy you, Princess?” Her voice had enough of a mocking tone that Lance barely restrained a whistle.

Allura didn’t respond. Rose pursed her lips and looked back to Shiro. “Do you have other questions for me? At least for now?” 

“Did you see any other humans?” Pidge asked. “My brother Matt and my dad were captured by the Galra – probably about a year and a half ago. We think they were sent to a prison somewhere.” 

Rose shook her head. “I’m sorry. You’re the first humans I’ve seen since the Anzu was captured.” She paused. “How did all of you get out here? Were you a Garrison mission as well?”

“It’s kinda crazy!” Lance said excitedly. As he spoke, he made animated gestures at each of them. “Shiro was on a mission to Kerberos with Pidge’s family, and they were captured by Galra, but he escaped and got back to Earth. Then we rescued him and found the Blue Lion, and then it wormholed us to Allura and Coran, who are the last Alteans and were in these cryopods, and now we’re taking down the Galra Empire!”

Rose blinked several times, digesting the information Lance had relayed so quickly. “Wait. Kerberos? The Galra made it to Earth’s solar system?”

“Oh, that’s nothing!” Lance said. “There was a cruiser just orbiting Earth before we lured it away with the Blue Lion.”

She looked panicked. “Zarkon made it to earth?”

“No, they chased us and left, as far as we know,” Hunk interjected. “Earth’s still safe.”

“But they’ve been in our solar system. They were _there_. They know about Earth and they could go back any time.” She ran her hands through her hair nervously, pulling out shorter strands and messing up the smooth braid Allura had done for her. “They must have gotten info off our shuttle’s systems. They hadn’t made it that far when they captured us.”

“Your mission was the reason the Galra were near Kerberos?” Keith asked.

Rose glanced at him, then at Shiro. “Maybe. It seems likely. Sorry.”

Shiro shrugged. “No one’s to blame but the Galra,” he said quietly. 

After a moment, Rose asked, “So you all just travel around with this Voltron thing fighting the Empire?”

“Pretty much,” Hunk answered. 

She bit her lip again. From how chapped her lips were Shiro thought that seemed to be a habit. “So what happens to me and the prisoners in the pods?”

“When they’re well enough, we’ll loan them a pod to return to their homes,” Coran said. Shiro wasn’t sure if he was deliberately avoiding answering the first part of Rose’s question. Rose wasn’t having it.

“And me?”

“Do you want to go back to Earth?” Allura asked, her voice still a little cold.  
Rose shook her head. “I want to find my crew. I can’t go back until I know what happened to them.”

Allura frowned. “I’m not sure that’s a reasonable course of action.”

Shiro noticed Rose’s hands tighten on her cup again. “I don’t care if it’s reasonable.” 

“And how do you propose to find them?” Allura asked.

“I don’t know. I just…I have to find them. They’re family.” Shiro looked away, instantly recognizing the quiet desperation in her tone. He caught Pidge’s eyes and saw Rose’s expression mirrored on the green paladin’s face. 

“Is Earth even a good idea?” Keith asked. “I mean, when we rescued Shiro at the Garrison he was sedated and strapped to a table.”

“And we already know they’re not being honest about what they know,” Pidge added. “I mean they lied about the Kerberos mission _and_ we just found out they had a secret space exploration program none of us knew about.”

“I’m not going back to Earth without my crew anyway, so it doesn’t matter,” Rose said. 

Allura opened her mouth to object, but Coran cut her off. “We don’t have to figure this out right now,” he said gently. “We could all use some sleep. There’s a spare room near mine. We’ll put you up there for now.”

After a moment, Rose nodded. “Thank you,” she said quietly. “All of you. For everything.”

“Let’s get you settled to sleep,” Coran said. “This way, and while we’re walking I can tell you about how my grandfather built the castle—” They disappeared down the hallway.

For a moment no one said anything. Then, Lance asked, “So do you think she’s telling the truth, Shiro?”

Shiro put his hands out in a shrug. “It’s hard to believe. I remember the names she mentioned, especially Onwudiwe – he was legendary. But they all died in a training accident a few years ago.”

“No, the _Garrison_ said he died in a training accident,” Keith objected. “There’s no reason to think the Garrison wouldn’t do this and cover it up. After all, they said the Kerberos mission was lost because of pilot error.”

Shiro winced. That one still stung. 

Allura said firmly, “I still don’t think she can be trusted. Especially if she was helping the Empire.”   
“It didn’t sound like she had a choice, Allura,” Lance demurred. 

The princess sighed. “I’m not saying her situation is her fault. Or that she’s a bad person. But I do not think we can trust her. We need to be cautious about our allies. And even if it sounds harsh, agreeing to help the Empire probably did more damage than the lives they would have taken had she refused.”

“What about Thace? Keth and Kolivan said he had to do his job and help the Empire to get information to the Blade,” Lance argued. 

Allura glared at him. “That was different. Thace was working to bring down Zarkon from the inside.”

“But so was she!” Lance shot back.

“We only have her word for that!” Allura said, her voice rising.

“All right!” Shiro interjected, his tone final. “Let’s just be careful, okay team? Be cautious, don’t divulge nonessential information for now. Sound good?” No one objected, and that was good enough for now. “Let’s all get some rest. See you all for training in the morning.”

The others filed out. Keith gave Shiro a brief glance – “are you okay?” – and Shiro nodded in response. He still had half a mug of tea, and figured that was a good enough excuse to stay in place for a moment while he absorbed what he’d just heard. 

To his surprise, Allura stayed in her chair. Shiro met her gaze across the table, impressed that even when she looked exhausted and royally pissed off, Allura still managed to look capable and in control. 

After a moment, she asked, “What are your thoughts about this situation, Shiro?”

Shiro’s thoughts were that he wished Keith were in charge.

After a moment, he answered, “The only possibility I see for the moment is keeping her on board, at least until she’s healed up.”

It was a moment before Allura spoke. “And how did you come to that conclusion?”

Shiro barely kept his exasperated sigh back as he shrugged. “What else can we do?” 

She shrugged. “Send her back to her home planet, the same as we do for any other rescued prisoner.”

He shook his head. “It’s more complicated than that, Princess.”

Allura’s mouth tightened. “I’m not sure why people insist on telling me things I understand perfectly well are ‘more complicated.’”

Shiro flinched at the rebuke. “You’re right. I’m sorry. But people on Earth don’t know about…all this.” He’d barely stopped himself from saying “aliens.” “And she seems set on not going back.”

Allura gave him a long, hard look. “We have more important things to worry about.”

“I know that, but is it really going to turn the balance if we wait a few days?” Shiro noticed he was tapping two of his fingers on his mug, and stilled.

“We don’t know what’s going to turn the balance. We thought Zarkon was gone, but _someone_ is clearly still making decisions and acting on his behalf. We haven’t defeated the Empire yet.”

“I know that, but we’re not in immediate danger. I think we can take a few quieter days to figure this out, but it’s your decision, Princess.”

Allura considered, frowning. Shiro wondered if it was his imagination, or if she was doing that more than he remembered. “If that’s your assessment, then we will give her a few quintants. We shouldn’t do anything that might risk the lives of the other rescued prisoners while they’re on the ship, either.”

“So…” Shiro hesitated.

“So we rest for a few quintants.” 

He nodded. “Sounds good, Princess.” He stood up to take his mug to the kitchen.

“Shiro,” Allura started, her voice more hesitant than it had been.

“Yes, Princess?”

“Are you…doing all right?”

Shiro paused. “I’m fine, Princess.”

“I just…I suppose today can’t have been easy for you,” she said, curling her hands around her mug.

Shiro gave her a fond smile. “Thank you for asking. It’s been a strange day, but I’m hanging in there.”

Allura nodded. “Right. I just…your health is important to me. Yours and all the paladins, that is. Not just yours. Well, especially yours, right now. I suppose.” 

Shiro decided to ignore the fact that Allura was blushing and stumbling over her words. “Thank you, Princess. Good night.”

“Good night, Shiro.”

It was only later, in his room, that Shiro really had a chance to think through what he’d heard. A secret space exploration mission, a Garrison cover-up – it felt more like a sensationalist novel than real life. And they had no way of knowing how much of Rose told them was truthful. And he hadn’t even considered what she’d said about Onwudiwe…

Shiro fell back on the bed with a sigh. If Rose was telling the truth, his hero hadn’t died in a training accident so many years ago. 

As he drifted off, he wondered what other lies he’d been told.


	4. Chapter 3

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This chapter and the next were one chapter at first, but it was SO LONG I split it at the only place that makes sense. Which means there's one short chapter and one long-ish chapter, as opposed to one SUPER LONG chapter. Enjoy!

Shiro didn’t sleep well, not that he was surprised. The odd lights at the prison had reminded him too much of what little he could remember of his own captivity, and the swirl of his unsettled thoughts when he was awake mixed with nightmares when he slept. It was a relief when his alarm went off and he could focus on his morning exercise routine. Moving was good. Moving was soothing. He cleaned up and headed to the kitchen for breakfast. 

As usual, Shiro and Coran were the first ones up. Sometimes Allura joined them, but the others tended to sleep in – that is, if they’d gone to sleep at all; getting Pidge to actually go to bed was almost impossible sometimes. They’d agreed to estimate a twenty-four hour cycle while in space, and as often as they could allow it Shiro let the team sleep in for nine or ten hours – they were teenagers, after all. Allura had objected at first, but she’d relented as soon as he’d explained most humans needed a minimum of eight hours (an amount that seemed excessive to Alteans; really no wonder humans were barely in space if they spent a third of their lives asleep!). 

Shiro nodded to Coran, who saluted, and found himself a bowl of food goo. “So, Shiro, what’s the plan for today?”

Shiro shrugged. “Training as usual. Otherwise, I’m not sure. Allura and I talked last night about taking it easy for a few days I. think everyone could use a rest after yesterday.” He paused for a bite of food goo. “How long until the rescues are out of the cryopods?”

Coran shrugged. “Could be a few quintants. I don’t expect anyone to be healed up quite yet. We do have one Uthralit with us – they tend to be quite resilient, so it’s possible they’ll be out today. I’ll check on them after breakfast.”

“Need any help with repairs to the castle?”

“Nothing urgent. Really, everything’s running quite well.”

“I guess it’ll be a slow day for everyone then.” After a moment, he asked, “Any word from Rose?”

Coran shook his head. “She didn’t say much last night. Asked for something to write on and a utensil. My guess is she’s still asleep. She might sleep for a few extra vargas, if not longer.”

“And you’re monitoring if she leaves her room?”

The Altean raised his eyebrows. “Seems a touch intrusive, doesn’t it? We don’t track you paladins’ movements.”

“She’s not a paladin,” Shiro answered. Then, “What do you think we should do about her, Coran?” Over time, Shiro had come to value Coran’s advice – even if it was often accompanied by a seemingly interminable story.

Coran sighed and folded his hands, resting his chin on them. “Well, first, it seems it would be cruel to boot the poor lady from the ship before she’s been able to recover from at least the worst of the…last while. That gives us maybe ten quintants – though I will admit I’m basing my calculations off you paladins’ healing times, and it seems her body might not be able to heal itself quite as quickly as you strong and well-fed young people.” Shiro nodded – stress and malnutrition would do that. 

“Second, I cannot imagine simply dropping her on an unknown world and hoping she’ll adjust. Third, it seems returning her to your earth is out of the question, unless she and you are willing to risk drawing the Empire’s attention to earth. And she seems opposed to returning to Earth without her crew. In addition, it seems that you all are uncertain of whether you can trust your own officials?” Though it stung, Shiro nodded. “In that case, it seems even more inadvisable to return her to earth.”

“That leaves us with three options: letting her go off to find her crewmates, placing her with one of our allies, or letting her stay aboard the ship.”

“She can’t just go off into space on her own. And she’s not staying on the ship,” Shiro said.

Coran considered, eyes on Shiro’s face. “Is that such a bad idea? The ship was made to hold more than just seven beings and five lions. I could use the assistance, certainly. It takes quite a lot to keep this old castle running. An extra pair of hands wouldn’t be amiss.”

Shiro’s jaw tightened. “I’m not dragging another person into this fight. We risk our lives every day – I can’t even count the number of times the ship has nearly been blown up. We’re not going to risk the lives of anyone who’s not essential to forming Voltron and keeping the ship going. And you’ve managed to keep the ship running well so far on your own.”

“And what were you planning to do with the Green Paladin’s family when you find them?”

It wasn’t as though the question hadn’t occurred to Shiro. He just didn’t want to have to think about it. “That’s different. They’re Pidge’s family.”

Coran shrugged. “Then I’m sure the Arusians, the Olkari, or the Balmerans would be happy to host her. As long as she agrees.”

Shiro lifted another spoonful of goo. “She won’t really have a choice.”

Coran raised his eyebrows. “So you would force someone to live on an alien planet when they didn’t wish to do so?”

“That’s not what I’m saying, Coran. All I’m saying is, once we explain that it’s the only viable option I’m sure she’ll agree.”

Coran leaned back, playing with his moustache. “As you say, Shiro. Ah, good morning number four!” Keith grunted and grabbed a bowl of goo. The three of them sat in silence as Allura, Hunk, and Lance came in one by one, all groggy and quiet. 

“All right,” Shiro said after they all finished eating. “Time to train. Where’s Pidge?” 

“Guessing still asleep,” Lance said with a yawn. 

Shiro groaned. “Who wants to wake her up?” Coran and Allura studiously avoided his gaze, while the Paladins looked slightly terrified. “Fine, I’ll do it,” Shiro huffed, rolling his eyes. 

“Hey, man, I will happily take an ion cannon blast before I have to wake up Pidge,” Hunk admitted. 

“It’s someone else’s turn next time,” Shiro threatened. “Meet you at the training deck.” He headed toward Pidge’s room, bracing himself for her near-certain fury. He rounded the last corner before Pidge’s room, only for someone to smash into him head-on with an “ooph!” Shiro stumbled a bit; Rose fell backwards, dropping a stack of the paper-like writing surfaces Alteans used sometimes in place of more advanced technology.

“Sorry,” Rose apologized, gathering up the papers. “I wasn’t watching where I was going.” Her voice was slow and halting, and again Shiro wondered how much she’d spoken in the last few years.

“No, it was my fault,” Shiro said, getting on his knees to help pick up the papers. “I wasn’t expecting anyone in this part of the castle,” he added.

“I think I took a wrong turn –I was looking for you. Or anyone, really.” Shiro passed her the stack of papers he’d collected, and she added her stack before passing them back to him. “Here. This is everything I remember from…before.”

“Oh,” Shiro said in surprise, thumbing through the pages. “Thank you.” He paused. “When did you put this together?” 

“Last night.” He glanced up to see Rose was looking at him intently. “Do you think this will help you?”

Shiro grimaced. “Well, we do have information from the Blade of Marmora,” he answered, trying to be kind while not telling her anything she didn’t already know.

Rose blinked. “Right. I didn’t think of that. I guess you won’t…need these then. Sorry. Just…trying to be helpful.” She reached for the papers, but Shiro held on to them. 

“You might have information the Blade doesn’t have. This could still be useful. Thanks.” 

S hiro stood up, offering her a hand (he double-checked himself – yes, he’d reached his left hand out). She took it and stood, dropping it quickly and shyly. “I’ll take a look at these.”

She nodded again. “How do I get to the kitchen?” 

Shiro gave her directions, then walked to Pidge’s door and knocked. “Pidge! Time to train!” He heard a soft moan through the door, followed by “not morning yet…”

“Pidge! Come on, get up!” The door opened with Pidge standing in front of it in her pajamas. 

“Okay, Shiro, I’m on my way. Don’t get your boxers twisted.” 

“Pidge, language.” 

Pidge rolled her eyes and shut the door in his face. Shiro muttered something about “extra pushups” and headed for the training deck.

**

Their performance against the droids and gladiators was less cohesive than usual, and Shiro blamed himself. Try as he might, he couldn’t forget there was an extra person – a person who didn’t belong there – in the castle. It didn’t feel right. And if he were honest, he was still getting used to the black bayard – the others used their weapons like an extension of their bodies, and the part of Shiro’s mind that wasn’t engaged in the fight recognized ruefully that he _used_ to fight that way, with his arm. In comparison, the bayard felt clumsy. 

But it wasn’t just him – Pidge seemed off too, missing shots she usually made and taking hits she blocked a few days before. Had they had days this rough before? He couldn’t remember one since their first few weeks as a team.

He could feel the frustration building. Keith’s movements got less controlled and larger, Hunk’s shots were wild, and though Lance still hit most of his targets, he also tripped and fell twice. Their calls to each other sounded sharper and more harried.

After they’d been at it an hour and the tension was almost palpable, Shiro called a halt. 

“Let’s just take the rest of the day off. We’ve had a lot going on,” he said. “We need a rest day.”

Keith and Lance immediately headed for the showers, bickering about some shot that Keith thought Lance should have made, while Lance argued it was impossible for anyone to make it. Hunk hurried after them, trying to placate them both. Pidge was slower to head out, so Shiro took the opportunity to pull her aside.

“You okay, Pidge?” he asked. 

She shrugged. “Fine. Just didn’t sleep well.”

“Pidge,” Shiro said quietly with a tone of “I know something’s wrong”. 

Pidge turned away. “Look, I’m fine, it’s just…we’ve seen lots of bad things, right? And yesterday was bad. I’ll get over it.”

Shiro’s stomach dropped as he remembered the panic in her voice yesterday. “I’m so sorry, Pidge. I wish it hadn’t been you who had to go first.”

“So that another one of us would have to? You don’t have to protect me, Shiro.” She rubbed her arms as if she were cold. “I just need a day.” 

Shiro gave her a quick hug and ruffled her hair (something he knew she only pretended to hate). “Go have some fun and hack something,” he said with a shove toward the door. Pidge rolled her eyes. 

“All right,” he said to himself, looking around the empty room. “What now?”

Shiro wasn’t…comfortable with downtime. Downtime meant being alone with his thoughts, with the guilt he felt over the Holts and what he (probably) did as Champion, his homesickness, and his worry over keeping his friends safe.

Well, he didn’t have to be _alone_ with his thoughts, at least. He made his way to Black’s hangar. The nudging sense in the back of his mind – his awareness of Black’s consciousness in his own – intensified as he got closer to the lion. “Hey there,” he murmured, leaning back against one of Black’s front legs.

Black sensed his discomfort; he felt her question in his mind, a combination of concern and bewilderment. “It’s nothing, girl,” Shiro answered. He let the images of the rescue yesterday and of Rose float to the front of his consciousness, along with the wariness that came with having an extra person on the ship and his worry for Pidge. Lastly his exhaustion from sleeping poorly crossed their connection, and he felt Black’s disapproval. “Yeah, I know, I know.” 

Shiro felt a nudge of frustration, as if she were saying, “You _say_ you know, but you still don’t take care of yourself.” It was immediately followed by a feeling of such warmth and affection that he caught his breath. Sometimes he forgot just how much Black cared for him, and her more intense reminders made him feel so loved and safe that they seemed to still his heart in his chest. 

“I love you too, girl.” He patted her leg gently. 

Since he’d come back, Black’s affection had become more… _vocal_ wasn’t quite the right word, but it was about as close as he could get. That last battle had truly cemented their bond, and now Black was almost as talkative as the other paladins made their lions sound, to Shiro’s pleasure. For his part, every time he looked at his lion – and she was definitely _his_ now, as much as Shiro was hers—Shiro felt the same rush of awe and joy that had flooded him when the Castle’s hangar opened on her for the first time. 

She purred briefly, but then projected his image of Rose back to him, along with a curiosity that seemed to say, “What about this creature makes you worried?”

Shiro sighed. “I’m not sure.” He knew he didn’t need words to communicate with Black, but he found it comforting to speak aloud sometimes. “It’s just so strange to find another human out here.”

Her responding nudge felt like a snort, as if she were saying, “ _You_ ended up here somehow.”

He rolled his eyes. “That’s different though. She says she was on a mission none of us even knew about. It’s hard to believe.”

If she had been human, Black would have rolled her eyes, and a feeling of _how hard is it to believe when you ended up piloting a giant space robot cat_ came across their connection. Except the “giant space robot cat” part was in human words. 

“Giant space robot cat?” he asked, amused. “You got that from Hunk, didn’t you?” A shard of an image flooded his mind – Keith in Black’s cockpit, black bayard in hand, yelling in frustration about “giant space robot cats”. The sense of loss in Black’s consciousness immediately informed him it was a memory from when he’d been gone. 

That was all it took for Shiro to feel guilty and rub a hand along Black’s leg. “I’m sorry, girl.” If Black made sounds beyond roars and purrs, she would have been keening; the accompanying feeling clearly conveyed that she didn’t blame him, only had missed him. “I know. I missed you too.” Partly to change the subject, and partly because he was curious, he asked, “What do you think about our rescue, huh?” Again, he let the image of Rose drift to the front of his mind. 

The feeling he got in response was complex, and it took Shiro a few moments to tease the pieces out. First, something that felt like sympathy, coupled with a memory of Zarkon as a paladin and a sense of regret; that part wasn’t too hard – Black had been at Zarkon’s command once, too. Then a feeling that didn’t correlate perfectly with anything Shiro could name. Something like the sensation of knowing all the Lions were safe in their hangars, a sort of contentment mixed with safety and purpose. “I’m not following,” Shiro murmured. “But if you’re going to tell me she should stay here, too, don’t bother.”

He felt a prickle in response, like someone were mentally flicking their fingers against his head, before his feeling of Black’s awareness went blank. Shiro huffed. “Fine, be that way,” he said without any real irritation. After a moment she reappeared, startling a laugh from Shiro. It reminded him of nothing so much as a child playing peek-a-boo. “You got me,” he said softly. “Let’s just sit for a while, okay?” A feeling of assent drifted across their connection, and Shiro slid down to sit on the floor, resting his back and head comfortably against her leg. 


	5. Chapter 4

Eventually he realized it was close to lunchtime, and because Shiro had made a promise to Hunk that he would stop skipping meals, he gave Black one last pat and wandered back to the kitchen. 

Hunk was busy with some kind of kitchen implement – when he glanced up and saw Shiro, the yellow paladin pointed the giant spork at him and threatened, “You can stay if you _don’t touch anything_.” 

Shiro smiled and lifted his hands in a pacifying gesture. He’d accepted a long time ago that he was more of a menace than a help in Hunk’s kitchen. “Where is everyone? I thought it was almost time to eat.”

Hunk shrugged. “I underestimated the boiling point of pre-frozen space goo. It’ll be a few more minutes. Keith and Pidge are off somewhere.”

Alarm bells started going off in Shiro’s head. “Doing what?”

“I’d bet you scaultrite lenses it’s got something to do with what Rose said last night. You know Pidge copied most of the classified Garrison files onto an external hard drive before we left?”

Shiro gave an exasperated sigh. Of course she did. 

“So after practice today Keith was like, ‘you wanna dig around and see what we can find out about that UFO?’ and Pidge was all like ‘heck yeah screw the Garrison those liars’ so I think they’re holed up somewhere with her laptop and some energy drinks.”

As much as he hated fulfilling the dad stereotypes the other paladins teased him about, Shiro couldn’t stop a second sigh. “I still don’t understand _why_ you didn’t stop them from buying all those alien energy drinks.”

Hunk paused his stirring. “Dude, we _tried._ But when Pidge and Keith decide to do something, they only listen to _you._ And you weren’t there to stop them—” he trailed off awkwardly, as he always did when Shiro’s being away came up. 

Shiro didn’t have a response to that. How could he? So instead he said, uncomfortably, “And you didn’t try to stop them from breaking into classified files today?”

Hunk set down the spork with more force than he needed. “Okay, first, Pidge said you told her to hack something, so that’s on you. Second, can you lay off? It wasn’t exactly easy around here for a while, and we did our best, all right?”

 _That_ was not was Shiro had expected. He wondered if it was the first time anyone had outright mentioned his absence in his hearing – it might be. He couldn’t remember another time, at least. And even though he’d wondered who would be the first to bring it up, his money hadn’t been on Hunk, and it certainly hadn’t been on Hunk _rebuking_ him. If he were honest with himself, though (and he always tried to be), he deserved it. “I’m sorry, Hunk.”

Hunk exhaled, his shoulders dropping. “It’s not your fault, man. We all know that. And we learned to cope. But – just remember, we did our best, and if it’s not up to your standards, that’s because you weren’t here to tell us how to do it right.”

Shiro thought he was safe, but Hunk took another breath. “Actually, there was something I wanted to talk to you about. That move you pulled yesterday with the fighters, when you were in my blast zone? That wasn’t cool, man. I could have hit you.”

Shiro’s jaw tightened. He’d take a reproach when he deserved it, but he didn’t deserve to be called out for being a good pilot. “No, you wouldn’t have. I had it.”

Hunk’s brown eyes were stern. “I’m not saying you didn’t have it, _that time._ I’m saying don’t try it again. If you were a second slower or I moved even a little –”

Shiro’s irritation was growing with every one of Hunk’s words. “I know the Black Lion, Hunk. I know my abilities. I had it. I wouldn’t have done it if I were a second slower.”

Hunk stepped back, his look thoughtful. “Shiro, are you doing okay, man?”

He blinked at the non sequitur. “I’m fine.”

Hunk looked skeptical. “Are you sure? Because it must have been a lot, being out there and coming back and –”

“I’m _fine,_ Hunk,” Shiro reiterated, more forcefully. 

On slow days like this feelings came up. Shiro thought sometimes slow days were worse than missions. 

Hunk opened his mouth to speak, but Shiro was saved by Coran’s loud voice behind him in the kitchen’s entryway. “—and _that,_ Rose, is how the first green paladin nearly ended up being worshipped as a goddess by the Yakalese dolups!” 

(It briefly occurred to Shiro that a benefit to having Rose on board meant that the paladins were spared some of Coran’s lengthier stories.)

Hunk look startled for a second, then grinned. “Coran my man! Come try this and tell me how it tastes.”

“Ah, Number Two!” (Hunk winced – Shiro agreed he’d gotten the most unfortunate nickname, and Coran hadn’t responded to Hunk’s requests he stopped. Lance, of course, found it hilarious.) “I thought I might find you here! I was just thinking about making my paladin lunch for Rose – full of nutrients, you know!”

Hunk and Shiro looked at each other in horror. “Coran,” Shiro said slowly, “if Rose can’t eat space goo, what makes you think she can digest a paladin lunch?”

“It’s yapurik, and the paladin lunch is meant to be easily metabolized.” He smiled broadly at Rose. “Just you wait – you’ll find the Bulgonian grubs quite satisfying, I’m sure.” Rose looked surprised and a little green after hearing “grubs”. 

“Maybe for now we just stick to klast bread, okay, Coran?” Shiro suggested. “Come try what Hunk’s been working on.” He, Coran, and Hunk ended up huddled over the bowl of space goo (somehow freezing it had turned it bright orange – Shiro was pretty certain he didn’t ever want to know what was in that stuff). “Has she said anything?”

Coran shook his head. “Not much. She’s very quiet. I enlisted her help with some of the less urgent repairs this morning. You know, we have a saying in Altean – “keeping the fingers engaged prevents the mind-feet from running to sad-dangerous things.” He paused. “Er – I suppose it sounds a bit more lyrical in Altean.”

Shiro shook his head. He glanced at Rose, who leaned against the counter, posture defensive. “Do you think she knows anything useful?”

Coran looked at Shiro in confusion. “She did say she gave you a written record of what she remembers.” 

“Right,” Shiro muttered, while Hunk looked at him in surprise.

“She did? When were you going to tell the rest of us?”

“It was this morning, right before training. It slipped my mind. Sorry, Hunk.”

Hunk looked grim. “Just make sure you pass it on to the rest of us when you’re done.”

“Yes, of course,” Shiro answered automatically. Part of him felt sheepish for not mentioning it sooner, but another part wondered why Hunk seemed bothered he hadn’t already disclosed something so trivial.

“Well, if the paladin lunch is off the table, we’ll try klast. I’ll fix her a plate, and you, Hunk, can finish up whatever you’re cooking up for lunch today.” Coran nodded decisively and strode towards one of the many cabinets (all of which were mysteries to Shiro). 

“Hey, Shiro, would you go round up the others? Lunch is almost ready.” 

Shiro nodded and went to check the usual haunts, finding Keith and Pidge in the lounge looking bleary-eyed and Allura at the control panel, and told them all to head to the dining room. He found Lance last, chatting with the mice and feeding them treats in one of the hallways. On the walk back to the dining room, he gave Lance a confused look and asked, “Can they even understand you?” 

Lance nodded. “I think so. They mime responses that make sense, at least.” After a moment, he asked, “How’s it going with bayard? Still getting used to it?”

Shiro shrugged. “It’s not completely comfortable. It doesn’t help that Zarkon used it for so long.”

Lance hesistated, then said, “It seemed like you were struggling with it a little this morning.” 

Trust Lance to notice something like that. “It’s taking some getting used to.” Then they were at the dining room, where Hunk was carrying bowls of food goo in from the kitchen, and Lance yelled something encouraging about how the goo smelled _great_ today. Pidge, Keith, and Allura were just a few steps behind them.

Shiro blinked when he noticed Rose was sitting quietly at the table, avoiding everyone’s eyes. Coran came out from the kitchen and smiled. “I thought Rose could join us for lunch today,” he said cheerfully, setting a plate of thin crackers next to her. Keith gave Shiro a skeptical glance, and Allura put on what Shiro thought of as her diplomatic face. 

In the shuffle of grabbing seats the chair next to Rose ended up being the only one open. Shiro sat down next to her, uncomfortably aware of her silence. She hunched a bit over the table, eyes on her fingers as she absently traced the surface. 

It felt like there was a wall next to him, rather than a person. Everyone else was quieter than usual, too, occasionally glancing over as they ate their goo. The silence continued to build, and Shiro grew more and more uncomfortable as it went on.

This was worse than his second day back. 

Finally, Shiro cleared his throat and turned to Rose. “I met Onwudiwe once, back on Earth.”

She glanced at him with mild surprise. “You did?”

Shiro nodded. “He did a lunch with a group of cadets, and Matt – Pidge’s brother – got us both in somehow.” A little embarrassed, he added, “He’s the reason I switched from astrophysics to pilot track.”

Rose didn’t smile, but her expression looked less sad for a moment. “I remember that a little. He came home pissed off and had a lot of meetings with Iverson over the next few weeks.” She paused. “It would have made him glad to know that you switched tracks because of him.” 

Shiro gave her what he hoped was a reassuring smile, but Rose stilled. “Wait. That was only a few months before we launched. You were a cadet then?” Again, Shiro nodded, and Rose looked at his face more closely, frowning. “How old are you?”

Lance snorted. “Five.”

Shiro rolled his eyes as Rose looked confused. “I’m twenty-two. But my birthday’s on February 29th and they don’t let me forget it.” 

“Oh.” Rose had gone a little red in the face. “Sorry. I thought – you look older.”

“Sorry?” Shiro asked, trying not to be annoyed. It wasn’t that he was vain, but having his hair start going white and gray in his early twenties was still a sore point (even though part of him recognized how ridiculous it was to resent the Galra for _that_ of all things). 

“Not in a bad way,” Rose said hurriedly. “That’s just young for a pilot – I’m surprised they trusted someone your age— I mean it’s not like you had a lot of experience before Kerberos I’m betting –” She stopped herself and sighed as Lance started laughing. “I’m just making this worse, aren’t I?”

Shiro shook his head, reminding himself that she _probably_ didn’t mean to question his ability. “It’s fine. Matt and I were on the young side. Younger than your crew, for sure.” He paused, taking in the gray in her hair and the lines on her forehead. “I guess you were a few years older than I am now when you launched.” 

Rose winced. “I was twenty-one, actually.” She ran her fingers along the part in her hair self-consciously. “Guess I should start looking for hair dye.”

“Oh.” So captivity had aged her the same way it had him. He wondered if it stung for her, too, to see what looked like lost time in the mirror every day. “Sorry.” 

She shrugged. 

“Wait,” Lance asked, “if you’re so young why were you surprised that Shiro was the Kerberos pilot?”

“I was crew, not a pilot,” she said, then turned back to Shiro, her face thoughtful. “I guess it makes sense that they’d let you pilot so young, though. Except for Yabani, there weren’t really any Garrison pilots older than you, were there? And definitely none with any exploration experience.”

“I was the first pilot certified after the Garrison reinstated the exploratory pilot track.” He tried to keep the pride out of his voice, but it had been a huge accomplishment, and one that he was still proud of. He couldn’t forget the disparaging news articles that called the Garrison’s exploratory pilot track a “waste of resources” and its cadets “dreamers without grounding in reality.”

“I know your planet has achieved little space exploration, but why so few pilots?” Allura asked in surprise. “It seems very short-sighted.” 

Rose frowned at her tone, though Shiro thought Allura sounded curious rather than condescending. She paused, long enough that Hunk cut in and answered for her. 

“A couple things happened,” he said. “Everything space-related got suspended during the war, first off. That set us back a couple decades. After that ended, there were a couple retired air force pilots who retrained for space travel –”

“Like Yabani,” Rose interrupted.

“Like Onwudiwe,” Hunk agreed, then continued: “But there weren’t many of them. And a lot of people said space exploration was pointless and expensive and too dangerous, so there wasn’t a ton of funding available. Even the moon base was really controversial.”

Rose nodded. “Right. And when the Garrison’s pilot training program was just getting up and running again—” she glanced around at the paladins. “You all must know about this. The accident, I mean.”

They all nodded. Everyone at the Garrison knew the story.

“An accident?” Coran prodded.

“Before my time,” Rose answered. “The first class of Garrison pilots – there was an explosion at one of the facilities, a bad one. Most of the class of trainees and a bunch of instructors died. They suspended the program after that.” Rose glanced at Shiro. “Until you showed up, I guess.”

Shiro nodded. “There were five others who were finishing up right after me. And by the time Keith and Lance got there, they were running a whole class of fighter pilots.”

After a moment when no one spoke, Allura looked around at all of them. “The more I learn of your story, the more convinced I am it was destiny that brought you five here,” she said, awe in her voice.

Rose snorted. 

Allura turned sharply toward the human woman. “Something amuses you?”

Rose smoothed her expression. “No. Don’t mind me.” Her voice was mild, but somehow still seemed almost mocking, at least to Shiro.

“You don’t think it’s strange that Shiro was picked for the Kerberos mission only because there were no other pilots available? You said yourself it seemed odd that your Garrison would choose someone so young for such a role.”

“I think Shiro was the only pilot available because of a gas leak and bad luck,” Rose said flatly. “Destiny had nothing to do with it.” Shiro was trying (again) to give her the benefit of the doubt and assume she didn’t mean “the only pilot available” as an insult, but it was getting more and more difficult. 

“You really don’t see any evidence of a higher power in the string of coincidences that brought these five young people to pilot Voltron?” Allura asked, exasperated. 

“No, I don’t.” Rose’s expression was icy as she met Allura’s gaze. “I stopped believing in higher powers a long time ago.”

Lance glanced anxiously between the two women, then at Shiro. Shiro could guess his thought process – he was looking for any way avoid the fight that was brewing, and hoping Shiro had an answer. Shiro shrugged – if he was honest with himself he was curious about what made Allura so convinced that they could save the universe. Besides, Allura could hold her own. 

“So you don’t believe that some unseen force united them to defeat Zarkon and the Galra?” Allura asked, heat in her voice. “What about the fact that your mission occurred only because a Galra craft crashed on your planet? Or that the ship that captured Shiro might have only been in your solar system because your mission was captured?”

Rose’s jaw tightened. When she spoke, her voice was clipped. “I refuse to believe that I went through hell and lost everyone I cared about because I’m a pawn in some convoluted plot to bring down an empire. And your ‘higher power,’ Princess, had a hell of a long time to put together a way to defeat Zarkon. It didn’t. It’s let Zarkon destroy lives for longer than anyone I met can remember. So even if it _is_ out there, it’s doing a shitty job.”

Allura’s eyes snapped as she took in Rose’s hard expression. “Alteans believe the all-knowing Ancients guide our actions for the greater good. I would appreciate it if you would at least keep your disrespect for my beliefs to yourself.”

“Then don’t act like I’m just a means to an end.”

Allura looked at the paladins with frustration—specifically, at Shiro. “And do all of you Paladins feel that you’re here by chance rather than something greater?” From her tone, it was clear she hoped Shiro would back her up. 

It wasn’t that unreasonable for her to think so, after all. Shiro had embraced being a Paladin faster than any of the others – it made sense for Allura to think he would agree that fate had put them where they were. But in all honesty he wasn’t sure why any higher power with an interest in justice couldn’t just smite Zarkon itself. 

So he simply said, “Maybe we should save the philosophical discussions for another time, okay?”

Rose shrugged. Allura looked at him with wide and hurt eyes. Shiro looked away from her, only to find Keith’s eyes on him, eyebrows raised. Shiro could guess Keith was thinking back to late-night conversations they’d had at the Garrison, when they’d snuck into the desert after lights out to watch the stars. One night when Keith confessed he was an agnostic Shiro had argued vehemently that there was no way something as wondrous as the universe could exist without something larger than themselves, at least a prime mover, and started a friendly argument that lasted on and off almost until the sun came up. Shiro gave a tiny shrug. 

As if in response to the awkwardness, Lance started gathering up plates and cleaning up, challenging Pidge to a video game tournament as he did. That started a round of smack-talk that didn’t really distract anyone and lasted until Coran’s ticker started beeping. 

“Ah! I believe one of our patients might be out of the cryopod soon!” he exclaimed, leaping out of his chair. “Shall we go greet them?”

Allura stood up. “Yes, I believe we should.” Keith and Lance followed, while Hunk and Pidge took the last few plates to the kitchen. 

Coran looked at Rose. “Care to tag along?” 

For a moment, she hesitated, and Shiro thought she almost looked scared. Then, she said, “You go ahead. I’ll follow you in a minute.”

“You know how to get there?” Shiro asked doubtfully.

“It’s just down the hall and turn right at the fifth corridor, then down the staircase, right?” 

Coran beamed. “Well done, Rose! You’re learning your way around beautifully! Shall we, Shiro?”

Shiro hesitated – he wasn’t comfortable with the idea of Rose wandering around unescorted, but was reassured when Plachu scampered up onto the table in front of Rose. Rose held a hand out tentatively, and to her surprise the little blue mouse made its way onto her shoulder; Shiro reminded himself to thank Allura for thinking of using the mice to keep an eye on her. If Rose went anywhere other than the infirmary, Allura would know. 

He and Coran fell into step in the hallway. “Interesting discussion between the Princess and our rescue,” Coran said evenly. When Shiro didn’t respond, Coran continued, “From my conversations with Lance I was under the impression humans believe in a god.”

“Some of us do,” Shiro answered with a shrug. 

“Fascinating.” After a moment, he continued, “I rather thought you were more in Allura’s camp on the higher power issue.”

What in the universe could he say to that? He waited to collect himself, then said, “Coran, that’s a topic humans are sometimes private about.” 

“Ah. Well. Very strange. I’m not sure if you humans will ever make sense to me!” He seemed cheerful as he entered the infirmary, where the other paladins and Allura were already waiting. He began humming to himself as he checked some sort of device in front of each cryopod. 

After ten minutes of drumming his fingers on his leg (and wondering where Rose was), Shiro asked, “Coran, how much longer?” 

“This big fella is our Uthralit guest – they should be out any moment now,” Coran answered, gesturing to the pod in front of him. 

As if on cue, the pod opened, and Coran barely caught the eight-foot-tall creature that stumbled out. “Coran, careful!” Allura called, noticing before the rest of them that the big Uthralit had both a nonfunctioning Galra tech left leg with wires hanging off of it and a mangled biological leg. Unprepared for a being who couldn’t support his own weight, Coran and the creature tumbled to the ground as Allura and the paladins rushed to help.

“Coran! Are you all right?” Allura asked as she helped him up. He waved her off. 

“Fine, fine, just a bit of a shock!” 

Lance tried to help the creature up, but the being knocked him flying. He bellowed, making the instruments on Coran’s metal table rattle and prompting the mice to hide behind another pod. 

Without hesitation Keith pulled out his knife and leapt at the creature. He aimed a punch at the paladin, but Keith dodged. With his other massive fist, the creature hit Keith straight in the stomach. Keith was knocked to the side, wheezing. Shiro activated the blade tech in his arm and rushed the creature, who was using his arms to pull themself towards Allura and Coran, still yelling angrily. Hunk and Pidge weren’t far behind Shiro, though they didn’t have their bayards handy.

“Matak!” 

The creature stopped and turned to see Rose running through the doorway, blinking all four of his eyes. “Rose?”

“Stop, please!” 

The Utralit called Matak held his hands up in a gesture of surrender just as Shiro leapt for his, arm-blade aimed for his face. Shiro just managed to twist his body to avoid striking the creature. Instead, he flew into Allura and Coran, knocking all of them back to the ground.

Rose reached the alien – Matak – and knelt beside him. “I didn’t realize it was you in there,” Rose said, her voice tight. Hunk and Pidge helped Shiro and Allura up, while Lance slipped Keith’s arm around his shoulder and helped him to his feet. 

Matak shifted so he sat on his behind and clasped Rose’s hand before pulling her into a hug. “I thought you were dead, Rose.”

“I thought _you_ were. It’s so good to see you.” She wrapped her arms around him, barely coming halfway around his enormous shoulders.

“So…this is touching, but one of you mind explaining what’s going on? Like why you _attacked us_?” Lance asked. 

Matak spared him a brief glance. “Sorry, little man. Thought you were Galra.”

“Do I _look_ Galra? Am I purple?” Lance retorted

Matak shrugged, seemingly unconcerned. “I wasn’t thinking. I meant no harm.” 

“Matak.” Rose let go and knelt next to him, but kept a hand on his shoulder. “These are the paladins of Voltron, and Princess Allura and Coran of Altea. They rescued us. The whole prison.”

Matak looked around at all of them, his free hand rubbing one of the tusks that grew from the side of his face. “That guard must’ve hit me harder than I thought, because I could’ve sworn you just told me a child’s story rescued us, Rose.”

Allura smiled serenely – Shiro wondered yet again how she managed to smooth her features into a welcoming expression so quickly; he could still feel his adrenaline pumping and still wasn’t convinced this creature wasn’t a threat. “I can assure you Voltron is real. And we are using it to bring down Zarkon’s empire. You are safe from harm.”

Rose squeezed his shoulder. “It’s real, Matak. You’re free.”

The big alien paused, and though his features were unlike anything Shiro had ever seen, he could only describe the alien’s expression as “dumbstruck”. “I never thought I’d hear that. ‘Specially after we got caught last time.” He turned to the others. “I’m sorry. I really am. The Galra hauled me off and I blacked out when I got hit in the head. I woke up here and didn’t know what was happening.”

“It’s all right,” Shiro said, extending a hand. “I’m Shiro.”

Matak looked at Shiro closely, two of his eyes blinking while the other two narrowed. “Champion?”

Shiro dropped his hand. The sound of his old nickname felt sour and metallic, and he thought he could taste blood. “They called me that.” He was vaguely aware that the others were staring at him, but the infirmary, Voltron, the castle, all felt far away. What felt close was sand and blood and the strain of too-heavy weapons in his hands.

“You might not mightn’t remember, but I was in the cells with you for a while, before I hurt my other leg—you know, the real one.” He paused. Matak’s voice seemed to be coming from a long distance. He closed his eyes – he couldn’t do this here. Patience yields focus. He took a deep breath, and then another, as Matak continued. 

“And now you’re a paladin of Voltron. Strange times.” Shiro opened his eyes, and the first thing he noticed was that Rose was staring at him, eyes wide. 

“Yes, sorry we can’t do more about the leg,” Coran said. Shiro almost jumped at the sound of Coran’s brisk voice, and supposed that Rose had guessed he wasn’t reacting well to hearing his old nickname. “The older an injury is, the harder for the pods to heal it. It appears yours is old enough your body has healed around it as much as it can.”

“That’s alright. I get places fine, when my tech’s running.” He looked at Rose, using his arms to pull the mechanical leg out straight in front of him. “You still think you can fix it?”

She looked away from Shiro and back to Matak, taking a second to bring herself back into the moment. She looked at Matak’s leg and sighed. “I don’t know, Matak, it’s worse than it was when I looked at it last.”

Matak didn’t seem bothered. “Well, that’s what I get for trying to take a squad with a busted leg.”

Rose looked at Shiro. “Can I take a look at his leg?”

Shiro looked at Allura, who shrugged. “I guess so.”

Rose started to run her hands along the mechanical leg, Pidge and Hunk peering around her to get a look. 

“Is this the best place?” Pidge asked, shoving her glasses up. “We have labs and workrooms you could use.”

Rose shook her head. “If it’s not a problem, it’s easiest to stay here and bring in supplies. Matak’s pretty heavy. Besides, most of the tools I’ll need for this are more medical than mechanical, anyway.”

Pidge and Hunk looked at each other excitedly. “Can we watch?” they asked in unified excitement. 

Rose shrugged. “Matak?”

“I don’t mind.”

“You should get comfortable, then,” Rose told them, shifting so her weight was on her knees. “This might take a while. And you might want earplugs.”

“Wait, why?” Pidge asked. Rose ignored her. 

After a few moments, Matak answered, looking uncomfortable. “Her fixes hurt, and I’m loud.”

Pidge raised her eyebrows. “Um…we have medicine, you know. We have anesthetic and sedatives, don’t we, Coran?” she asked, turning to the nodding Altean.

Both Rose and Matak stared at each other. “Sedatives. Right. That makes this easier.” She looked at Pidge almost sheepishly. “Before we…never mind.” Shiro tried to keep his face still as he realized what their conversation implied. 

“Well, you don’t need me for this,” Lance said, looking a little disturbed. “I’m headed out. Anyone else?” Keith and Allura both nodded. “See the rest of you at dinner.” The three left, Lance slinging an arm around Allura’s shoulders and Allura shoving him away playfully. 

Rose glanced at Shiro and Coran. “You don’t have to stay for this.”

“Happy to give you a hand,” Coran said cheerfully. “You need a sedative – what else?”

Rose bit her lip, considering. “Most of the tools on that table should be fine. But I’ll need a dibattel screwdriver and a size 12 – no, size 11 caplean lever to get the outer layer off. And maybe a precision saw, if you have one.”

Pidge and Hunk looked at each other joyfully. “We got it, we got it!” Hunk shouted as the two of them ran for the door. “Don’t start without us!” Pidge called back. Rose and Matak stared after them. “Weird kids,” Matak commented. 

Rose looked up at Shiro. “Are you staying?” He nodded. “Then will you help me get Matak laid out flat on the ground? Is that all right for you, Matak?”

“Sure, sure, sure,” he answered cheerfully.

“Let me just find that sedative for you,” Coran said, rummaging in shelves behind the pods. 

As Rose and Shiro helped Matak lay down on the floor (he was even heavier than he looked, Shiro thought), she asked him, “What happened to you after they caught you?”

“Grabbed me and started dragging me outside the walls. When I started fighting back I took a hit to the head and blacked out. You?”

She started folding the ragged leggings he wore away from the mechanical leg. “They locked me up.”

The big alien looked surprised. “That’s all?”

“That’s all.”

Matak shook his head. “I thought you were done for.”

“Not yet, I guess.”

Matak looked like he was about to say something else when Coran popped over. “Here it is, just a little pinch from the needle and then out like a yellmore during its hibernation!”

“I don’t know what you’re saying – ow – take care of me, Rose.”

Rose squeezed his hand. “See you soon, Matak.”

After the alien drifted off, Shiro asked, “He talking about when you got caught. What were you doing?”

She bit her lip before answering. “I’d stolen some parts and was trying to fix his leg. But it was less busted then.” 

Shiro looked at her intently – she wouldn’t meet his eyes. “Was that something you did often?”

“When needed.” She was pulling loose wires straight, something even Shiro could tell was unnecessary. 

“We’re back! Let’s get started!” Hunk ran back in, closely followed by Pidge. They put the tools they’d brought on the ground by Rose and sat across from her, watching expectantly.

“Thanks.” She barely glanced up before she picked up something at looked like a screwdriver.

She used the screwdriver to loosen the tiny screws holding the top layers of the leg in place, then another tool to lever the plates off. When the top calf plate came popped off, Pidge and Hunk both leaned in, making soft “oooooh” noises and looking like kids on their birthdays – until Rose moved the plate away for them to see underneath.

“That’s – kind of a letdown. It just looks like a metal tube with wires on it,” Hunk said. 

Rose put the screwdriver down. “This is just the top layer. Those wires carry the electrical charge that powers the energy functions and heat aspects. The white thread things over it like a spider web that disappear into the plate? Those are neurotransmitters that act like nerve endings. The darker wires that go through the holes in the plate are the super-insulated ones that carry charges from the interior microchips.” Carefully, Rose loosened some of the wires and removed the second layer; the short length of the wires gave her little room to maneuver in the interior part of the limb. However, she was still able to move the second metal plate out of the way with the ease of long practice.

“I’ve never seen the inside of a Galra prosthetic limb before,” Pidge said. “It’s crazy – it looks like muscle.”

“More than muscle. Those cord-looking things are flexible nanotubes that mimic the contraction and flexion of muscle tissue. There’s a metal skeletal structure underneath, and it’s all connected with flexible…something… that’s like ligaments and tendons. I can’t remember the word for it right now. And neurotransmitters throughout.”

“Is this what they all look like?” Hunk asked, glancing at Shiro.

“There are variants, but this is pretty much the standard for carbon-based land lifeforms with internal skeletons.” She paused. “Let’s see if we can figure out where the problem is.”

“Is that a data port?” Hunk asked, pointing to a part.

“Yes.” 

“Where are the microchips?” 

“The skeletal structure. Where you’d find marrow in a human bone.”

She continued answering questions, which both Hunk and Pidge asked rapid-fire, carefully peeling off outer layers to reveal more and more of the underlying structure. All along the way, she uncovered loose nanotubes and detached neurotransmitters. She had to take off several small plates around the knee joint before she found the root of the problem. When she did, she inhaled with a sharp hiss.

“Not good.”

Pidge and Hunk looked at each other in confusion. “What’s not good?” Hunk asked. 

“All of these nanotubes and neurotransmitters I can fix. That’s not complicated. But here, at the knee, he’s damaged the skeletal supports.” She pointed to what looked like the tip of a bone, and sure enough, once Shiro knew what to look for, he could see that the end was strangely ragged and shorter on one side than the other. “I don’t know how to fix that. And it looks like it’s damaged the microchips too.” She sighed. “This is bad. This is really bad.”

“If you can’t fix the leg, why don’t you just take it off?” Pidge asked. “I bet we could build him another one. It might not be as advanced, but it would work.”

Rose shook her head. “You don’t understand. These Galra tech limbs – they’re not like the prostheses we had on Earth. You can’t just take them off. I mean, some of them you can, but not the ones like this. Matak has one of the Druid ones. I don’t know how they do it, but all of these mechanical elements? They’re fused with his biological systems.”

“Oh, no,” Hunk whispered.

“I’m not following,” Pidge snapped. She wasn’t used to others understanding things before her, and Shiro knew she didn’t like feeling stupid. 

“The neurotransmitters are somehow fused to his actual nerves. The nanotubes have been attached to his muscles. And if I’m guessing right, the skeletal supports have been fused to his actual bones. It’s like he has a biological system, but it can’t heal itself. If we removed his leg, it would be like we were cutting off his actual leg.”

“So we take it off like it’s an amputation and put on a new prosthesis,” Pidge argued.

“You think I haven’t tried that? The Druids put in fail safes. If the limb is detached it kills the patient. I don’t know how, they just sort of…die. I killed four patients before I figured that out.”

Shiro blinked. Something about what Rose was saying – “fail safes” and “Druids” – tickled the back of his mind. Then it clicked. “Quintessence,” he murmured. 

Rose started, as if she’d forgotten he was there. “What?”

“We found out that the Druids have been experimenting with quintessence. I’ll bet they’re tying the patient’s quintessence to the limb somehow.”

Rose began to ask, “What’s quint—” but was interrupted by Coran’s growl. The others looked at him in surprise – he’d been quiet till then, passing Rose tools and holding wires out of her way. “That’s diabolical. Quintessence is supposed to be a healing force. Manipulating it and using it to kill – Zarkon and his Druids have corrupted one of the purest things in the universe.”

It was Hunk who broke the silence that followed Coran’s statement. “So we can’t get him a new leg. How do we fix this one?” he asked.

“I don’t know. I don’t know how to fix the microchips. And I don’t know what I can substitute for the skeleton.” Carefully, she removed a detached wire they could see hanging off the skeletal support. Shiro could tell it wasn’t necessary, but she still pulled it away almost tenderly. 

“What will happen?”

Rose sat back on her knees, looking crushed. “At best, he won’t have a functioning leg for the rest of his life. More likely, the damage, or some future damage because the whole system is so much weaker now, will trigger the fail safes and kill him.” She ran a hand through her hair, tugging at the roots. “I can’t believe he survived the gladiator arena, and the prison, and now this will probably be what kills him. The equivalent of a broken tibia.”

“There has to be a way to fix it,” Shiro argued. 

Rose glared at him. “If there is I haven’t found it. Every time I’ve seen someone with this type of damage it killed them.”

Hunk pressed his forefingers together nervously. “What about creating a bypass? If we re-routed the wires around the broken microchips and sealed them off – we might be able to keep it from killing him.”

“There’s some Olkari tech that uses vines as electrical conduits – maybe we could manipulate that and use it for the bypass? If it’s organic it might fuse better with his biological systems,” Pidge added.

“And if we used elblemium to isolate the damaged microchips, that might make an effective enough seal that the fail safes don’t trigger!” Coran added excitedly.

Rose was silent, her brow furrowed. Then, she looked at Coran in surprise. “You can do all that? You have the parts?”

Pidge, Hunk, and Coran all nodded.

“Yes…yes, that’s brilliant. That might work.” She pressed her hands against her neck, looking at the ceiling as she thought. “Yes, and if the Olkari tech can act as an insulator, we could keep the currents from damaging the neurotransmitters – oh, this is amazing. I can’t believe it. Yes! Let’s go!” 

“I’ll get the Olkari tech!” Pidge yelled.

“Gonna need some heavy duty wiring, be right back!” Hunk shouted.

“I bartered for some elblemium at the last swap moon we visited, let me find it!” Coran called as they all darted out the door. 

When the others left, the silence burned in Shiro’s ears. Rose kept her eyes determinedly on Matak’s leg. Shiro’s eyes followed and swept over the mess of wires, metal, and tools in front of them. “So that’s what they look like on the inside.”

Rose glanced at him. “Yeah. I’m guessing yours is a similar model, if that’s what you’re wondering. More complicated inside because you have a model that can be used as a tool or weapon, not just a limb.”

So she’d noticed that, when Matak had been attacking earlier. “And these are what the Galra soldiers have, too?” She shook her head.

“They use older models on the prisoners usually. The soldiers’ are more advanced versions of this.”

“ _More_ advanced?”

“Yes. They’re less clunky, more lifelike. The biggest difference is they figured out a way to integrate the circuitry with the nanotubes, so there’s only a single layer under the plate. Those are lighter, and they have more functionality as weapons. Some of them have _completely_ unnecessary functionality as weapons.” Shiro pursed his lips to keep from laughing at the snobbish tone in her voice.

He took a breath to ask another question, but the whoosh of the door interrupted him. “Found it!” Coran said, popping back into the room. “Pidge and Hunk are on their way as well. What other materials will we need?”

Rose began listing off tools that Shiro had never heard of. When Pidge and Hunk returned she listed off other materials for them to find, and they occasionally offered suggestions; she took some and rejected others, explaining the reasons behind it. Shiro stepped out of the way as the four of them swarmed around the sedated alien’s leg, saws whirring and pieces clacking against each other. 

Without meaning to, Shiro found himself watching Rose as she worked. She had a habit of biting her lip when she needed to do a tricky fix. Her face was serious and her shoulders tight as she made adjustments, and when her hair drifted into her face she pushed it away with sharp motions, and didn’t seem to care if she caught her nails on her skin in the process. Shiro told himself his focus on Rose was only because he’d seen Pidge, Hunk, and Coran concentrating on tasks more than once; Rose was an unknown. 

After some time they all paused and looked at each other, faces serious. “Okay,” Rose said. “Here we go.”

With a deep breath, she positioned the bypass they’d created above the damaged portion. Pidge used a whirring saw to cut through the skeletal supports. “Carefully –” Coran said as Hunk pulled them out of the way and Rose quickly moved the bypass into place. Pidge soldered the bypass to the supports and reattached the cut nanofibers and wires around it. More time passed as Rose directed Hunk how to reattach the neurotransmitters. After a while she screwed the first plate back on, then repositioned more wires and neurotransmitters, and finally began the tedious work of reattaching the other plates. Throughout the process Coran carefully monitored Matak’s breathing. 

When the last plate was screwed into place, Hunk let out a “Woo-hoo!” and high-fived Pidge. Rose intently watched Matak’s chest move as he breathed. “How long until we know whether it worked?” Shiro asked.

She tensed as if she’d forgotten he was there again. “The other patients died within a varga after making alterations.”

“So now we…wait?” Pidge asked. Rose nodded. Pidge readjusted so she was sitting cross-legged, while Hunk and Coran stood up and stretched. Rose didn’t move. 

Hunk, Pidge, and Shiro glanced at each other as the silence stretched on. Clearly Rose had no intention of starting a conversation herself. 

“So, Rose…what do you study to become a xenobiologist?” Pidge asked.

After a moment, Rose answered, “Biology and chemistry, mostly.” She didn’t lift her eyes from Matak’s chest. “Mostly bacteria and plants and some of the smaller, weirder things – tardigrades, extremophiles, things like that. Chemistry for understanding how non-carbon-based life might form. One physics class. Some probability because I thought it was fun. I took some anatomy and medical electives to back up Miguel as team medic. A little programming.”

“That’s… a lot of science,” Hunk said. 

Rose glanced at him briefly. “The Garrison doesn’t do things halfway. Besides, most of it came easily, at least at first.” She fell silent. 

Pidge gave Shiro a look, then continued, “You said you were in a special Garrison program. How did you get in?” 

Rose seemed to answer by rote, not really paying attention. “They picked me out when I was seven. I guess I scored well on some standardized tests. After that I lived at science-focused boarding schools mostly year-round. Then I was at the Garrison for a while, interned at a couple labs, and then got chosen for the Pytheas mission and trained for that.”

“And you were OK with leaving your family?” 

She shrugged. Something about her posture told Shiro they weren’t getting any more information about her family.

After a second Hunk asked, “So what was the hardest part about going into space?”

Rose actually grinned – Shiro realized it was the first time she’d smiled since the rescue. “I had a horrible coffee addiction. They wouldn’t let me go on the mission with any sort of chemical dependency. I was miserable for weeks. Every time I smelled coffee I about lost it. It was more about the comfort factor than the caffeine, but Rhys – our xenolinguist – had to stop me from going in a coffee shop a couple times.”

Pidge caught Shiro’s eyes and raised her own eyebrows. Shiro understood – it was probably the longest string of words any of them had heard her put together without it being a response to a direct question, and she was waxing poetic about coffee, of all things. 

“So from what you said earlier you lived with Commander Onwudiwe?” Hunk prompted.

She paused. “We all lived together, actually – me, Yabani, Rhys, Miguel, and Wei. We all shared an apartment in Yuma from when we were selected for the mission till launch. Command thought it would help us bond.”

“Were they right?” Hunk asked.

The corners of Rose’s lips turned up for half a second. “Yeah. We got really close.”

Shiro reminded himself to compliment Hunk for getting Rose to speak so casually. He was doing a good job of getting information about her past. They continued chatting, with Pidge or Coran occasionally throwing in a question, but Hunk driving the conversation, asking about her classes and her experience living off campus and working in biology labs. Along the way she’d let slip small nuggets of information that Shiro filed away to consider later. 

One thing shone through the conversation: Rose adored her crew. Whenever she mentioned one of their names, her face lit up and softened. It hurt his heart a little to see – it reminded him of how Commander Holt used to look at him and Matt, on the Kerberos mission. Shiro wouldn’t be surprised to find out he talked about Allura and the other paladins the same way.

After a while Rose asked Coran, “How long has it been?”

“Close to a varga.” He stood up. “I can see if I can find something to wake him up.” He started rummaging in drawers. 

Rose smiled thinly. “We might actually pull this off. Hunk, do you know if there’s anything he can use as a crutch or cane? He’ll need something for his bio leg.”

“Got it!” Hunk said, launching himself towards the door.

Hesitating, Pidge said, “Can I ask you a question? About the prisons?” Coran stiffened. Shiro felt himself catch his breath.

Rose paused for a moment before answering, “Sure.”

“How bad is it? How likely is it that someone…survives?”

Rose took hold of her forearm and rotated her wrist as if stretching out kinks, but something about the motion struck Shiro as insincere. Then after a long pause, she said, “It’s important to remember that it doesn’t benefit them to kill the prisoners, necessarily. We were doing work for them, after all. If you made it to the prison they’d already decided you weren’t enough of a threat that you should be executed. It’s hard, but the majority of people survive.” 

“Why were there so many bodies there, then?” Pidge asked, her voice accusing. Shiro tried not to let his surprise show. What was – the pieces slotted together – Pidge’s silence on the comms line and her performance that morning, the comment about BLIP signals outside the walls, and Matak’s comment about being dragged off. Suddenly he had a good guess of what she was talking about, and it turned his stomach to think of.

“There was an epidemic a while back,” Rose said. “Someone came in infected, and I don’t think it’s dangerous to humans – I’m pretty sure I would have gotten sick otherwise. It spread like wildfire between some of the other species, though. But from what I heard that was unusual.”

Pidge still looked worried, but at least a little less so. “Thanks. For being honest with me. I’m…I’m gonna go see if Hunk needs help.” She left, setting off in the opposite direction from where Hunk went.

It was quiet for a moment. Then, Shiro asked softly, “Was there really an epidemic?”

Rose glanced at him, looking tired. “There was.”

“But that’s not where the bodies came from.” 

“Not most of them. No.”

“Was that kind, to lie to her?” Coran asked. His back was to both of them as he sorted through a multitude of vials.

Rose shrugged. Shiro thought she didn’t seem too concerned. “I had two bad options and I chose the kinder one.” 

“She’s not a child. She won’t appreciate you lying,” Shiro said. 

He was met with a glare. “If you want to tell her, be my guest. I think telling the truth will do more harm than good. Can we wake Matak up?”

“Yes, I’ve found the drugs –” Coran said as Hunk came back through the door, carrying a long piece of metal soldered to resemble a crutch. “And…here were go,” he finished as he injected the drugs into Matak’s vein.

Within a few seconds Matak’s eyes fluttered open. “Rose?” 

“We think we fixed it, Matak We think you’ll be okay.”

Without hesitation Matak grabbed her hand. “I knew you’d keep me safe, Rose.”

“Let’s see if you can walk on it before you get all sentimental.” Rose looked at Hunk. “Would you all help me get him up?”

“I can stand up,” Matak said stubbornly, folding his tech leg under him.

Between Rose, Hunk, and Matak’s determined “helping”, the three of them managed to get the big alien on his feet. Hunk handed him the makeshift crutch as Matak rested his weight on the Galra tech leg.

“Let me see you walk,” Rose said, her gaze focused on his legs. 

“Rose, if you were interested, you had chances,” Matak said with a wink. Rose actually laughed.

“You’re the worst, Matak. See if I fix your tech next time.”

“I don’t want there to be a next time, Rose. Meaning no harm.”

“Yeah, yeah. Just move around a little so I can see what I messed up.” Matak obediently stepped forward, then back, then side to side, at Rose’s instruction. As she watched, he stood on one leg, lunged, and rotated his ankle. 

“You’re as good as I can make you, Matak.” She smiled at him. “What will you do, now you’re free?”

Matak twisted at the hips, stretching. “I want to find my husbands, and my child. I think I know where they might have gone.”

“We can give you a pod to go to your homeworld,” Coran offered.

“I’d like that.” He paused, then grabbed Rose and drew her in close for a hug. “I’d never have made it if you weren’t there, Rose. I don’t know what to say.”

Rose leaned into his chest and wrapped her arms as far as she could around his waist. “Just find your husbands and your baby, Matak.” Her voice was quiet enough that Shiro thought he was the only one to hear.

“I hate to interrupt, but I’d like to make sure you’re healthy for space travel, Mr. Matak,” Coran interrupted. “Paladins, I don’t think I’ll require any assistance, if you want to take a rest.”

Matak nodded. “See you later, Rose.”

“Bye, Mr. Matak!” Hunk said, moving towards the door and grabbing Rose. She let herself be pulled after him. Shiro followed. When the door had closed behind them, Hunk asked, “Husbands?”

Rose didn’t hesitate. “Yes, Matak has two. Three-marriage is the most common form of social bond for his kind, although pair- and four-marriage aren’t rare.”

Hunk paused. “So, it takes three of his kind to – you know – make a – baby?” he said slowly.

Rose shook her head. “No. They reproduce asexually. But from what Matak’s told me they like the company.”

“Oh. Right.” Hunk didn’t take long to adjust the new information – then again, Shiro thought proudly, he was always the best of them at adapting to new cultures and ideas. “How did you meet him?” 

Shiro had to admit he was also curious how an enormous ex-gladiator ended up friends with a human. 

“A friend of his brought him to me, not long after the Galra decided he couldn’t fight anymore. He’d damaged the leg and the friend thought I might be able to fix it.”

“Did you get caught that time, too?” Shiro asked.

“Not that time,” Rose answered absently, her mind clearly elsewhere. 

“Not that time? How many times did you get caught?”

She paused, coming back to herself. “A few.” Something in her voice convinced Shiro it wasn’t worth pressing.

Rose yawned, and Shiro remembered that she said she’d written everything she could remember during sleeping hours. “You look like you could use some sleep,” he said. 

“Lemme take you back to your room and you can take a nap before dinner,” Hunk offered. “Shiro, wanna head to the lounge and see if they started that video game tournament?”

Shiro smiled, but shook his head. “I have some catching up to do,” he demurred. 

Hunk shrugged, looking unsurprised. “See you at dinner, then?”

He nodded, and turned to the paladins' rooms as Hunk led Rose down the other hall.


	6. Chapter 5

The rest of the day was quiet, as if everyone really _was_ exhausted and needed some time to decompress. 

Shiro spent some time on the training deck, making up for the short practice from the morning and trying to become more comfortable with his new bayard. It still felt awkward, and even though he didn’t think it was possible, he could swear the bayard was fighting him to return to strange, alien shapes that Shiro didn’t want. Worse, even when the bayard took forms he requested – sword, phaser, axe, it didn’t matter – they were awkward and heavy, weighing him down rather than letting him move quickly and adapt to the environment the way his arm did. And as soon as he felt the first surge of frustration, the bayard would turn back to something he’d seen Zarkon wield, which felt even more alien. 

“I thought you were supposed to take a shape specific to _me_ ,” he muttered in frustration after an hour and the fifth time the bayard suddenly reverted to its old double-razor form. “But it makes sense, I guess – Zarkon’s imprinted on everything that’s supposed to be mine now. My lion, my bayard, my _arm_ —”

Black’s presence in his mind quickly came down with the force of one of her giant paws crushing an attacker, overwhelming him with a sense of _**Mine** now_. 

Shiro rolled his head neck and took a deep breath. “Yes, yours now, girl.” She dropped back contentedly. He liked this protective side of Black. He liked that she thought of him as _hers_ – it reminded him that even if the bayard wouldn’t cooperate, his lion had faith in him. 

He took a break to grab some water and sat down with his back against the wall for a minute. He was still resting when Keith came in, dressed for a hard workout and clearly thinking along the same lines as Shiro. Keith nodded at him with a smile. “Who’s winning the video game tournament?” Shiro asked, leaning his head back against the wall. 

“Are you kidding? Pidge is destroying everyone. Allura was giving her a run for her money for a while, but it didn’t last.” 

Shiro lifted his eyebrows, surprised. “Allura’s playing too?”

Keith gave another little smile. “Yeah. We taught her a while back. She’s pretty good.” He paused. “I think she shapeshifts her fingers longer to hit the buttons, but _I’m_ not going to tell on her.”

Shiro laughed, but some disappointment welled up at missing what had turned out to be a fun time with everyone. 

“Pidge said you figured out a way to save the leg,” Keith said, sliding down to sit next to Shiro.

He nodded. “Between Pidge, Hunk, Coran, and Rose, they found a way to fix it.”

“That’s something, at least.” He paused. “Up for a spar?”

Shiro tried to keep himself from grimacing, but of course Keith caught the twitch of his mouth that he couldn’t stop. “Or maybe not today,” the red paladin finished softly. They sat in silence for a moment, while Shiro considered whether he wanted to tell Keith about his struggles with the bayard.

But even though he gave a few half-hearted attempts at trying to put the words together, he gave up and let the silence continue.

Something about the silence reminded him of the first night, after they’d found him. People could only cry in relief and hug each other for so long, and eventually Shiro was back in his room, familiar, the closest thing to home he’d known in a long time, and yet so strange. The bed was made, as he always left it, but it was someone else’s work – the sheets weren’t tucked with the precise corners he’d perfected, and the blanket was ever-so-slightly rumpled. The dimmest setting of the lights – his room was never dark, Coran had seen to that as soon as he’d heard Hunk mention that Keith had let slip that Shiro hated the dark – was warmer than he remembered, a slightly orange glow that somehow seemed too bright. And the black paladin armor, which he’d always put in a careful arrangement in the corner (to minimize wasted movements in an emergency) was still laid out respectfully, but the pattern wasn’t his. 

He’d stood in the room, the silence feeling like a physical thing, after so long with the sounds of his own thoughts magnified and booming in his ears on the astral plane – thoughts had meaning there, and presence, and weight. But his room had been so quiet, and his thoughts were just that. Shiro had wanted to sleep, but he could swear purple lights played at the corners of his eyes, and when he looked they weren’t there. Whenever he closed his eyes, he saw the gleam of the Black Lion’s eyes, the only light in a field of violet, and jerked them back open, desperate for a reminder that he was back and safe. 

He lost track of how much time had passed when he’d heard a quiet knock. He’d opened the door to find Keith in red pajama pants and a black tee shirt that was too big for him, holding a pillow under his arm and looking both desperately sad and embarrassed beyond words. 

“Keith?” Shiro said, hoping that just saying his name contained all the feelings he couldn’t find words for.

“Can I stay here tonight? Just on the floor?” Keith’s arm tightened around the pillow. “I just…I can’t sleep.”

Shiro had put a hand on his friend’s shoulder, not sure he could speak around the lump in his chest. “There’s room for both of us on the bed.”

They’d slept in close quarters before, on camping trips and on nights when one of them needed some comfort. The two of them curling up back to back or side by side on a twin bed wasn’t unusual. But somehow, this time, Shiro was intensely aware of every place where Keith’s body touched his, and of the things they’d both left unsaid that made the air heavy.

Eventually Shiro had drifted off to sleep, and he assumed Keith had done the same. When he woke up in the middle of sleeping hours, Keith had been curled on his side, back to Shiro, and Shiro had managed to get up and leave for the training deck without waking him. He’d come back later that night and Keith was gone. Keith hadn’t come back to his room since. Shiro hadn’t mentioned that night, and neither had Keith – Shiro had his reasons and he guessed Keith did too. 

“Shiro?”

He glanced at Keith, who was looking at him with a worried expression. “You all right?”

Shiro nodded. “Sorry. Lost in thought.”

Keith looked at his wrist – apparently Pidge had built him a ticker. “It’s about dinner time. You want to go wash up and head downstairs?”

Shiro blinked. “You didn’t get your workout.”

Keith stood up and shrugged, then offered Shiro a hand. “I’ll come back later.”

Shiro frowned. It wasn’t like Keith to skip training, even the extra training he made for himself. “Are you sure?”

Keith shrugged again. “It’s not like there’s a lot going on today.”

Sometimes Shiro thought Keith hated slow days as much as he did. Adrenaline junkies, both of them. Then again, that was why they’d both ended up at the Garrison, he supposed.

“See you at dinner?” Keith asked, standing up and offering Shiro a hand. 

“Sure.” But as he headed off toward the showers, Shiro couldn’t shake the nagging feeling that Keith had left something unsaid – he just wasn’t sure what.

**

Shiro didn’t see Rose when he entered the dining room – though the other paladins, Allura, and Coran were already seated and waiting for him. When he asked where she was, Hunk shrugged and said she hadn’t answered when he knocked. “Figure she can use the extra sleep,” he added. 

“Then where’s Matak?” Shiro asked – the big alien had seemed all right, but Shiro was still not keen on letting anyone roam around the castle on their own.

Coran looked up from his goo. “I offered him a room to rest in, but he said if Rose agreed he’d prefer to stay with her. I assume he’s asleep as well.”

“So he’s just sleeping on her floor?” Lance asked.

Coran nodded. “The Uthralit generally sleep on igneous rock slabs that have been consecrated by their priests, but Matak assured me the floor would be fine in a pinch.”

“That’s actually really sweet,” Lance said, stirring his goo and ignoring Coran’s commentary. “I mean, the whole thing is horrible, but it’s nice that they’re close enough he wants to stay nearby.”

“They make a bit of an odd pair, but yes, Lance, I agree,” Coran added. 

Shiro considered giving Keith a smile, a secret between the two of them, but thought better of it and instead he kept his eyes on his spork as he lifted another mouthful of space goo – he didn’t want to put Keith in an awkward position. Especially in front of the team he’d been leading just a few weeks ago. 

“Do you know anything else about the Uthralit?” Hunk asked Coran. Shiro stifled his groan, but Pidge didn’t.

“Well, at least ten thousand years ago, the Uthralit were a fascinating species renowned for their ingenuity and directness. Terrible diplomats, as you might imagine – very bad at talking around an issue and not telling you what they think. But excellent allies, very loyal. Very dedicated to their religion, generally peaceful. In fact, there was one time King Alfor and I were at the Fripping Bulgonian and we ran into a rather testy Uthralit named Hrof, and…”

Shiro tuned out the rest of the story, feeling only a little bad for doing so. In the meantime, spooning his goo, he considered what their next steps should be. It was true they didn’t know who was leading the Empire now – but it didn’t appear to be Zarkon. In the little time they’d been with Voltron, he’d started to follow Zarkon’s style: if it wasn’t a big impact, Zarkon wouldn’t bother. But now, the Empire’s forces had started making smaller strikes, devastating in themselves, but not the same as Zarkon’s almost cumbersome maneuvers. In some ways, this new actor frightened Shiro more than Zarkon had – they were unpredictable, swift, and deadly. 

He wondered for a moment if that _witch_ had anything to do with it. In his gut he was sure she did.

“--And Hrof says to Kythilian Mu, if you twist it _that_ way any more you might make it squeak like a Gonirian at the Lakid Festival!” 

Lance and Hunk both laughed, Lance bent double, but Allura gasped and lowered her spork so forcefully it banged on the table. “ _Coran!_ That sort of language is _not appropriate_!” After a moment, she added with a sigh, “Though that does sound like Father to suggest twisting the Kuporian’s ear first.”

“Well, Princess, your father generally did have good reasons for doing what he did—” Coran said, stumbling slightly. 

Allura smiled, clearly trying to put her advisor at ease. “You don’t need to justify Father’s actions to me, Coran. Especially actions when he was clearly intoxicated.”

“We’d had a bit much, I’ll admit,” Coran added sheepishly. “But I’ll tell you now, the Uthralit are a very amicable species.” His face lengthened. “It saddens me that they’ve been enslaved by the Empire.” 

Allura reached across the table to touch Coran’s wrist, the manifestation of a tenderness they rarely showed around the Paladins. “We’ll help them, Coran. The Uthralit and all the others.”

Coran took Allura’s hand and struggled to smile at her. “I know we will, Princess. With you and Shiro leading us, what other outcome is there?”

Allura caught Shiro’s eyes, and he glanced away sheepishly. He wasn’t unaware of Allura’s feelings for him, the fact that his own feelings for her stopped at admiration and friendship, or the fact that someday he would have to reconcile the difference. 

Lance groaned when Allura suggested that since they’d taken the afternoon off they should spend the evening looking over logs of Galra communications and troop movements, but he didn’t object. Instead he turned to Pidge and said, “Bet you your last five energy drinks I figure out a pattern first.”

Pidge snorted. “What do I get when I win?”

“I’ll let you pick the movie next time it’s my choice.”

She grinned. “You’re on.”

Hours later, Lance and Pidge had called the bet off. With two tablets with different databases on the table in front of him, Shiro still hadn’t found anything himself. He frowned at the fifth list of Galra shipping route changes he’d seen that night, trying desperately to see some kind of order in the diversions and movements.

He looked up when someone poked his side. “Hey,” Pidge said, turning back to her laptop. “I think I found something.”

Shiro noticed they were the only ones left at the table (though Keith and Lance had both left the screens they’d been using lying haphazard on their chairs). “What have you got?”

“It might be nothing,” Pidge hedged. Her glasses reflected strings of letters from other languages as the computer processed the data.

“What is it?”

“There’s been an uptick in biotech malfunctions reported by military officials. It’s small, but it’s definitely statistically significant at p less than five. There’s a good chance it’s not random, I mean.”

“I remember what p-values are, Pidge. So what does that mean?” he asked, putting his tablet aside.

“There’s a lot of possibilities. It could mean the Galra aren’t as good at biotech as we thought. It could be a function of more widespread use – no, that would most likely increase confidence in the results, never mind that option. It could still be random, a function of the time period, or they’re doing something that makes it more likely for biotech to malfunction. Or it could be sabotage.”

Shiro processed briefly. “So you’re saying Rose might be telling the truth.”

“I’m saying there’s some evidence that supports her story, but what I’m seeing could also be caused by a thousand other things.”

“Well, it’s something. Thanks, Pidge.”

“No problem.” She stood up. “Everyone else headed out a varga ago. We should probably get some sleep too. You coming?”

“In a minute.” He picked the tablet back up, but Pidge reached around him to turn it off. 

“You’ve been staring at the same data for half an hour. And I told you three times I’d already run an algorithm on that database and didn’t find anything. Go to bed, Shiro.”

He looked up (he didn’t usually have to do that with Pidge, he thought), surprised. “You did?”

“Yeah. I don’t think you heard me.” She frowned. “You doing okay?”

Shiro stood up. “I’m fine, Pidge. Just a lot on my mind.”

Her face softened. “Yeah, I guess it’s been a weird day. Anyway, I’m gonna get some sleep. You should, too.” 

He didn’t sleep – he wandered to the bridge to take a look at the stars for a bit, ran into Coran and listened politely to some story about King Groggery the Infirm, and woke Hunk up from the couch to send him to bed before he headed toward his room. He still didn’t feel tired.

Instead of sleeping, he spent the night reading the papers Rose had given him and considering how they impacted what he already knew. In spite of his reservations, he was impressed – Rose had outlined the details of troop movements, schedules, and snippets she’d heard from other prisoners. None of it in itself was groundbreaking, but taken together it gave him a fair sense of how the Empire had used the mining camp and a few ideas for targets they should look into. And Rose had classified everything she could remember in a neat taxonomy, organized by subject matter. He wondered how many hours it took her, and whether doing so had helped her feel safer or more useful.

It was about four hours after he got back to his room (he’d napped a little, at least) when he reached a section labeled “Non-Bio Tech.” Rose had detailed locks and keypads, some sketches of mining equipment, and…some of those looked vaguely familiar, in his mind like an itch he couldn’t scratch – particularly in the section labeled “Weapons.” As he read through the descriptions, the ways she’d seen them used, and particularly the details of how prisoners were punished for disobedience (realizing she must have experienced some of those first hand), he felt anger creeping up, so slowly he didn’t notice at first. It was only when he noticed his hand clenched around the edge of the table that he stopped and took a breath, and then another, and a third, forcing himself to exhale slowly. 

H e put the papers down. Rose might be cataloging her information to cope; Shiro had developed his own coping methods. He left the pages on the table and headed for the training deck. 

**

Shiro woke at his usual hour, despite his late night. He was used to it – sleep was a luxury they didn’t always get. What he wasn’t used to was entering the dining room and finding Coran enthusiastically talking to an eight-foot-tall Uthralit. Coran waved and then returned to a conversation about…something Shiro couldn’t follow. Some kind of technology? He tried to pay attention, but technology wasn’t his strong point, so eventually he found himself zoning out, thinking again about what they should do next – everything was so uncertain now, it was hard to plot a course.

“Shiro,” Coran interrupted his train of thoughts. “Perhaps you can answer a question for Matak. I only know so much about human biology, after all.”

Shiro’s stomach dropped – Coran’s questions on human biology ranged from “harmless” to “deeply embarrassing” to “so weird I don’t even wanna _think_ about that what the _quiznak_ Coran” (Lance’s words). “I can try,” he answered hesitantly.

“How normal is regurgitation for humans?” 

Shiro did his best to hide his grimace. Where did Coran get these ideas? “Not. Unless they’re Hunk.”

Coran nodded, pulling absently at his moustache. “That was my hypothesis, but for some species it’s normal for females of a certain age to—”

“Nope. Not talking about this over breakfast, Coran.” Shiro paused, and even though he wasn’t sure he wanted the answer, continued, “Why do you ask?”

It was Matak who answered, face worried “Rose. She was vomiting last night, and told me it wasn’t anything to worry about.” 

Shiro frowned. “It could be nothing. How often?” 

“Every couple vargas.”

“She might be sick.” He paused, his stomach dropping. “Rose said there was an epidemic at the prison –” but Matak was shaking his head.

“The Namastian flux? That wouldn’t be it. Only affects species with a Furovian organ, and Rose said humans didn’t have those. She said you only have one set of respiratory organs – what’d she call ‘em – lungs. She’s seemed off for a few spiculian movements now, but we had other things to worry about.”

Coran frowned. “Then she might do better in the cryopod for a tick or two.”

Matak nodded. “I’ll see if I can talk her into it. Mind if I stick around another quintant?”

“I’d prefer it, honestly,” Coran answered. “You seem to be doing well, but if you’re going to insist on going off on your own I’d like to be assured you’re not going to fall ill five lightyears out.”

“What do you mean, going off on your own?” Shiro asked, unease growing by the second.

Matak shrugged. “My home planet’s in the middle of a system that’s been under Galra control for centuries. It’s not going to be easy to sneak back and find my family.”

“We could help,” Shiro said, but Matak was shaking his head. 

“You couldn’t get this ship near there without having half the Galra fleet on you. It’s not worth the risk.”

Shiro sat back, frowning. It made his skin itch to know there was a planet full of people who needed help, and they couldn’t do anything – but there were thousands of planets under Galra control. The only thing that made Matak’s world different was that Matak was sitting in front of him. But if Matak was saying it was too risky, then it wasn’t the right time. 

He came back to himself when Matak rapped the table. “Don’t worry, Champion. They’ve held out this long, they can hold on a little longer.”

He thought about arguing. But they couldn’t save the whole universe in one stroke – they’d tried that already, and failed. And nearly died in the process. And, some rebellious part of his brain reminded him, he’d gotten stranded alone and – 

Shiro forced himself to take a deep breath. That kind of thinking didn’t fix anything. Time to change the subject. Think about things he could affect. 

“Coran,” he said, “is there anything nearby we could use to practice flying with the lions while we’re here?”

Coran beamed. “There’s an asteroid belt not a few ticks away! That would be good for practice.”

Shiro nodded. “Asteroid belt it is.”

**

 _“Lance!”_ Shiro barked, swerving Black to stay out of the way as the Blue lion suddenly rose into his line of sight.

“Shiro, I swear that asteroid was not there a minute ago!”

“It was.” 

“Keith, I _do not need your opinion_.”

“It’s not an opinion, it’s a fact. The asteroid didn’t move.” Keith’s voice was still deadpan.

“Your input is not appreciated, mullet!” 

“Insult my haircut all you want. At least I can fly my lion.”

“Can we all just agree that the asteroid didn’t move and go home?” Pidge whined. “We’ve been doing shuttles for hours. We all know Keith and Shiro can turn on a dime and the rest of us can’t.”

“Speak for yourself, Pidge.”

“Lance, you just clipped an asteroid. An asteroid the size of Proteus.”

“Proteus is a small moon!”

Shiro sank back in his chair for a moment, thinking the never-ending mantra of patience-yields-focus he had to use with this crew some days. “All right! You all head in.”

“You’re not coming?” Keith asked over the comms line, voice wary.

“Just going to run a few more drills on my own. I’ll be back before too long.”

Keith paused before answering. “All right. See you at the Castle.” 

Shiro waited until the quiet hum of the other lions had disappeared. Then, he murmured, “Time to fly,” and pushed Black’s controls to full speed.

It was exhilarating, the rush of moving faster than he’d ever imagined possible while Black’s unfettered joy – something he’d only started to feel recently – egged him on. For a moment he wasn’t thinking outside himself, wasn’t analyzing events as they happened or trying to plan the next move. He and Black careened around asteroids at breakneck speed, Black responding to the barest nudge of his thoughts. Even if all the forces of the universe had pressed him, he wouldn’t be able to say where he ended and the Black Lion began.

He wasn’t sure how far they’d gone before he felt a hint of trepidation. Shiro slowed down, enough that he could concentrate on his bond with Black instead of the rush of speed. “What’s wrong?” he asked, checking the sensors and controls – everything was fine.

But Black was insistent – something was wrong. He felt a push like he’d felt when she’d rebuked him for not getting enough sleep, and he noticed his hands were shaking on the controls. Shiro swept his eyes from one side of the cockpit to the other, and it took his brain a moment to catch up. As he paid attention to himself, instead of himself/Black Lion, he realized his body was exhausted.

“You’re right. You always are,” he muttered, forcing his hands away from the controls. He used the time it took for a deep breath to study the stars he could see. They glowed in a multitude of colors, appearing cool and distant, concealing the heat and destruction he knew they harbored. Still, it never failed to leaved him awed. If he went a little farther, he could probably get an amazing view of that nebula showing up on the sensors -- 

Black pushed her way into his mind again, stern, crowding out thoughts of flying further with concern. Shiro bit back his irritation – he knew his limits. But Black’s intrusion escalated into a growl. Shiro wasn’t going to jeopardize their bond by pushing her for something as small as wanting to explore further without a good reason. “All right, girl. Let’s go home.”

**

He stepped out of his Lion to find Pidge waiting for him, arms crossed and a peeved look on her face. “You’ve been gone for hours,” she said, her voice accusing. “You missed lunch. Keith was getting worried.”

Shiro pulled off his helmet, shaking off beads of sweat. “I lost track of time. You haven’t been waiting here this whole time, have you?”

She shook her head. “I came up when the Black Lion showed up on the Castle’s sensors. Coran says he thinks another of the rescues is going to come out soon.”

Shiro raised his eyebrows. “That was fast.” 

Pidge shrugged. “He was surprised, too. But he told me to come get you. Figured you’d want to be there.”

He rolled his shoulders, feeling the effects of hours of flying on his muscles. “Coming.” He wiped his forehead and winced – he needed a shower. “Do I have time to get cleaned up?” 

“Probably not.” 

“Hey, Pidge? Why didn’t you just tell me over the comms line?”

She shrugged. “Felt like a walk.” 

“Really?”

She rolled her eyes. “Yes, really. Not everything’s subtext, Shiro. Sometimes a walk is just a walk.” 

Shiro reminded himself (yet again) that Pidge was not suited for espionage missions. Sometimes she reminded him so much of Matt – Matt was a terrible liar, too. But Pidge was headed back down to the infirmary, and Shiro jogged to catch up. 

It felt strange, to be back in the infirmary again so soon, waiting for another cryopod to open. All of them but one were filled with gas in various colors and opacity, but Coran was hovering impatiently around one that swirled with dark blue gas. Pidge took a seat next to Allura on the floor and joined her in playing with the mice. Shiro stayed back a bit and waited, as minutes stretched on into half an hour, then an hour. 

The room was so quiet the whoosh of the first pod opening startled them. This creature – a thin, leggy being with four insect-like arms – managed to stand on their own as their eyes opened. Allura offered them a hand down and a smile. “Welcome to the Castle of Lions. I am Princess Allura of Altea. You were rescued a few quintants ago from a Galra prison by the paladins of Voltron.” 

The creature sighed as they stepped down from the pod. “Thank you, Princess. I am Xera. I am grateful for your help.” They glanced around the room, taking in Shiro’s neutral expression, Pidge’s hopeful look, and Coran bustling toward them with a blanket and tea. They accepted both from Coran with a sigh, lowering themself to sit on a step. “Are these the paladins? I think another helped me from the cell where the Galra kept me.”

“Two of the paladins. This is Shiro, paladin of the Black Lion, and Pidge, paladin of the Green Lion.” Allura caught Shiro’s eye and gave a slight nod toward Xera. Shiro took that as his cue to step forward.

“Xera, we’ve been asking everyone we help – do you have any information about the Empire that might help us? Do you know who’s in charge now?”

“No,” Xera answered. “We heard little. We existed simply to mine the ore, and to die.” 

Pidge looked at Shiro in alarm. He tried to think of a way to mitigate the damage of what Xera had said, and came up empty. He’d have to talk to her later – hopefully he could reassure her that Commander Holt and Matt would survive a Galra prison. “You don’t know anything? How they use the ore, schedules, anything?”

Xera shook their head. 

“What about Zarkon? Have you heard anything about whether he’s still leading the Empire?”

Another head shake. Shiro reminded himself to be patient as the infirmary door opened. 

“Coran, Matak is asking for more of the salve you gave him for—” Rose paused when she saw Xera. Xera, in turn, stilled. Then the pincers around Xera’s mouth began to click furiously. 

“Keep that _butcher_ away from me,” they hissed. 

“Hey!” Pidge objected, eyes narrowing.

Rose backed up to the doorway. But Shiro recognized her stance – weight slightly back, arms angled so they could easily move to protect the stomach and face – as that of someone who expected an attack. He settled into his own fighting stance, though if it came down to it he wasn’t sure who he’d be defending. 

Allura’s smile faded. “She was also rescued. She is a guest as much as you are –”

“No, it’s fine.” Rose said quietly. “I’ll go.” She turned to leave the room.

Allura looked back at Xera, her lips pursed and displeasure making her face forbidding. 

Xera was unapologetic. “You should have left that creature to die.”

Pidge caught Shiro’s gaze, her enormous eyes even wider. 

“I will not tolerate that type of speech about another rescued prisoner,” Allura said imperially. “I cannot imagine what you have gone through, and so I will make allowances for that. But I will ask you to keep your personal feelings about Rose to yourself.”

The clicking began again, just as fast as the first time. “That creature is a murderer. I will not apologize for speaking the truth.” 

Allura continued to glare at Xera, and the clicking slowed. “But I will respect your wishes. I will not speak about the creature again.”

“Not quite,” Allura said. “I have questions. What makes you believe she’s a murderer?”

“I do not believe, I _know_. She helped the Galra scum. She repaired their armor and weapons. And to do it, she killed prisoners with Galra technology and used the pieces to repair the soldiers’.”

“How do you know that?” Pidge asked, looking skeptical and disturbed.

Xera made a gesture that seemed to resemble a shrug. “Some of the ones with Galra technology disappeared. One of them told me he was going to ask that one for help when his prosthetic broke. I tried to tell him not to, but he didn’t listen. I never saw him again.”

“But—”

“Pidge,” Shiro said quietly. Pidge met his eyes and saw the warning in his face. She quieted. Shiro turned to Xera. “So do you know anything that could help us? Anything at all about the Empire?

“No. I have been in the prison for years. I know nothing outside it.” Xera made a noise that sounded almost like a hiss. “But I know this much. You’ll regret the quintant you let that creature live.”

“That’s enough,” Allura said. “Coran will make sure you are stable for travel, and we will give you transportation to your home world or a world of your choosing next quintant. But I will not stand for rumor-mongering.”

Xera seemed unconcerned. “I won’t need to say anything. As soon as the others you’ve rescued see her, they will tell you the same thing.”

Allura purse her lips. “I’d like to ask some questions about your home world, and how long the Galra have been there. Do you feel well enough to answer them now?” Xera nodded.

Coran tapped Shiro’s shoulder. “Shiro,” he said quietly. “Would you mind giving this to Rose?” He passed over a small container -- probably the salve Rose had asked for. “I’d do it myself, but –” he glanced sidelong at Xera. Shiro couldn’t blame him – he didn’t to leave Allura alone with Xera either. For a moment, Shiro was torn between wanting to get any possible information from Xera and complying with Coran’s request. But Allura could update him later – and maybe Rose would be shaken enough to volunteer some information on her own for once. With a sigh, Shiro nodded and left to find their other rescue.

To his surprise Rose was leaning against the wall not far from the door to the infirmary, arms hugging herself and shoulders hunched forward. “Coran asked me to give you this.” 

Rose glanced at him and the jar in his hand. Shiro passed it over. Rose held it loosely, her other arm still wrapped around her torso defensively. 

For half a second, he considered leaving her there and heading back in to hear what else Xera had to say. But he’d never been able to ignore someone’s hurt. And Rose looked like she was hurting. 

“Are you all right?” he asked.

“Fine.” Her voice was strained and made her a liar. 

“Are you sure?” Shiro leaned against the wall next to her.

Rose took a deep breath. “Fine is relative. I’ll survive.” She snorted. “But apparently that’s the problem.”

So she’d heard Xera say they wished she’d been left to die – that had to sting. The castle’s walls weren’t soundproof, after all. But Shiro could understand her trying to shake off anything that wasn’t an immediate threat, especially if they were just words. He’d done the same thing, more than once. It was what he’d had to do to survive. 

“I’m sorry,” he said quietly. “What they said wasn’t fair.” Or at least, it wasn’t from what he already knew.

She shook her head, and when she spoke she sounded angrier than he’d heard her before. “None of this is fair. What’s one more jackass alien on top of the shittiness of this entire situation?” After a moment, she continued in a softer voice, “Sorry. You can tell Xera I’ll stay away from the med bay.” She turned and strode down the hall. 

Shiro looked after her for a moment, then leaned his own head back against the wall. He was preparing himself to go back into the infirmary when the door opened and Pidge came out. Shiro gave her a questioning look.

“You might not want to go back in there. Xera is being really difficult and Allura’s two steps from losing it.”

“That’s more reason to go back in,” Shiro started, but the door opened again and Allura exited. As the doors closed behind her, she took a deep breath. 

“Coran suggested I leave the information-gathering to him in this case,” she said calmly. Behind her, Pidge mouthed “kicked her out” at Shiro. Shiro struggled to keep a straight face. 

“Anything you need help with, Princess?”

“No, thank you Shiro.” She took another deep breath. “I believe I might use this unexpected free time to practice my close-range combat skills. If you need me, I’ll be on the training deck.” As she walked away, Shiro heard her mutter “ _quiznaking_ recalcitrant, difficult, Achiodipal flamureks…”

When she was out of hearing range, Pidge muttered, “So there’s gonna be a bunch of broken gladiators to clean up next time we want to use the training deck?”

Shiro nodded. “Yep.”

“Stay away from that wing of the castle for a few hours?”

“Yep.”

“Yellow’s hangar is about as far as you can get from the training deck.”

Shiro chuckled. “Let’s see what Hunk’s working on.”

The started toward the Yellow Lion’s hangar in silence, but Pidge was fidgeting as she walked. Shiro waited patiently until she asked, “Do you think Xera was telling the truth?” Pidge.

Shiro considered before answering. “It’s easy for rumors and misinformation to spread when people are scared. You heard what the first prisoners we rescued said about me.”

“True.” After a pause, she added, “I’d really like to think Rose isn’t some kind of twisted Galra tech Frankenstein.” Shiro didn’t have anything to add to that. Pidge was still fidgeting – so that wasn’t what was really bothering her. 

Shiro could wait. He was good at that. 

Finally, about halfway to the hanger, Pidge started, “So what Xera said about the prison. That’s not what Rose said.”

Shiro grimaced – he should have known that would be what was on her mind. “Pidge, we’ll find Matt and your father. They’re going to be all right.”

“‘We existed to mine the ore and die.’ That was what they said.” There was an edge of panic coming into her voice. 

Shiro stopped, putting a hand on Pidge’s shoulder to slow her down. “I know. But humans are more resilient than a lot of species. Look at Rose – she survived in that prison for years.”

Her eyes were getting watery. “But she also said she thought her crew didn’t make it—” 

Shiro shook his head. “Then why is she so eager to get out of her and find them? She thinks they’re alive. She’s probably just trying to prepare herself for the worst.”

Pidge bit her lip, looking away. “Katie,” Shiro said, “they’re going to be okay. We’ll find them. I’m not giving up.”

She threw her arms around him. “Thanks.” Shiro hugged her back, letting himself relax just a bit. When Pidge pulled away, she pulled off her glasses to wipe her eyes, then said, “Let’s find Hunk.”

When they finished the long trek to Yellow’s hangar, Hunk turned from his workbench and waved. “Hey you two! I was just asking Rose about some of the equipment we picked up.” He went back to whatever he was working on, explaining something excitedly. 

“What are you working on?” Shiro asked Hunk as he and Pidge neared the table. 

“Just one of the smaller pieces of mining equipment I picked up. Rose was telling me about how she’d seen it used. It sounds like they used a steam-powered engine to—” 

“Xera said you killed other prisoners,” Pidge blurted. 

Shiro struggled to keep a straight face. He knew none of the other paladins could keep a secret worth a damn, but _really?_

Hunk stilled, glancing wide-eyed at Shiro for guidance. “ _Pidge,_ ” Shiro said sternly, but Rose interrupted him, as if she’d been prepared for the question. 

“Technically that’s true.” 

“Technically?” Pidge asked.

Rose leaned forward, to Shiro’s mind entirely too casual about being accused of murder – though, on second glance, she’d shifted her weight into a position that would let her bolt easily from her chair. Shiro wondered if she’d done it intentionally. “Like I said the other day. It took me a while to figure out there were fail safes in the Druid tech. I kept trying to fix them, and remove the tech if the damage was bad enough. So yeah, I killed people.”

“You didn’t realize they were dying because you damaged the tech?” Pidge pressed. 

“They almost always had injuries as well. It make it harder to figure out the problem.”

“So why would Xera hate you so much?” Shiro tried to give Pidge a warning look. But the green paladin wasn’t paying attention to him, intent on the problem in front of her. 

It took Rose a moment to answer. “Some of the people who died might have made it, if it wasn’t for me fucking with their tech. The Galra treated me better than some of the other prisoners – once they realized I could do repairs they didn’t make me do other work. And I didn’t exactly spread around that I was doing my best to sabotage soldiers’ repairs. I didn’t have a death wish.” 

“They said you used dead prisoners’ tech for repairs for the Galra.”

“Pidge, that’s enough,” Shiro warned. 

Rose ignored him and answered, her eyes on Pidge. “Yeah. I did.” After a moment, Rose added, “It’s not like they gave me a choice. And it’s not something I like to think about.”

Pidge looked at her feet. “Sorry,” she said quietly. 

Rose was quiet for a moment as Shiro searched his mind for a way to fix the situation, and came up empty. Then she added, “I’m trying to answer your questions because I know the information might help you. But it’s hard to talk about. I’d appreciate if you’d remember that.”

“Yeah. Sorry.” Pidge stood up. “I’m gonna…go.” She left. After a second, Hunk glanced at Shiro, then followed, calling her name.

As soon as the door shut behind Pidge, Rose seemed to deflate, resting her arms on the workbench. Shiro glanced back at the door Pidge and Hunk had gone through, not sure if he should follow. 

“Was I out of line?” Rose asked quietly. 

“She’s worried about her family. Xera was…more blunt than you were.” It didn’t feel like much of an excuse, but Shiro thought it was something, at least. 

Ro se was still. Shiro didn’t know what to do or say – he used to, he remembered. But lately it felt harder. So the silence stayed, until Rose asked, “Is it hard for you, too? Answering questions from…before?”

After a pause, Shiro answered, “They don’t ask about it.”

Rose looked up at him, surprise on her features. Had she slept at all? The skin under her eyes was purple and her cheeks still had a gray-yellow tint that didn’t look healthy. “Really?”

Shiro glanced at his arm. “I don’t remember much. Just bits and pieces. And when I do remember things—it’s never a convenient time.”

Rose didn’t respond right away. Eventually she asked, “What do you remember?”

He paused, wary. Why did she want to know? “My first fight. That’s the only thing I remember clearly. Escaping, sort of. Everything between that is foggy.”

She bit her lip. “Do you remember anything from when they gave you the arm?”

Shiro locked his hands behind his back to put his Galra limb out of sight. “Weren’t you just reminding Pidge some things are hard to talk about?” he asked, his tone sharper than he intended.

Rose flinched. “Sorry. You’re right. I’m sorry.” 

She looked rattled enough that Shiro almost regretted saying anything. Too late now. “You look tired. You should get some sleep.” Rose nodded, not meeting his eyes, and left. 

Shiro freed his arms and looked at his prosthetic, trying to quell the swirl of fear and anger Rose’s question brought up. Looking at the stars always calmed him down. He’d go to the bridge and watch the stars for a while. Hopefully he’d be alone. 

He spent hours doing his best to not think, looking at the stars in the distance and identifying the systems on the ship’s database. Midway through mapping out one system they could explore – it seemed to lie in the line of several Empire supply waystations, and might be worth checking out – he realized he’d missed dinner by a few vargas. Hunk would tell him off for that. Well, he had a stash of ration bars in his room for times like this.

Shiro was on his way back to his room when he heard low voices – the fact that he couldn’t place them immediately meant they had to be Rose and Matak. He stopped out of sight, and was about to go in another direction when he heard, “—and he doesn’t remember anything from before?”

He stayed put.

“He says he doesn’t.” That was Rose. 

“Not even—”

“I didn’t ask about specifics.” 

Shiro didn’t need the silence that followed to process what he was hearing: they were talking about him, and at least Matak was surprised there was something particular he didn’t remember. Knowing he was the subject of the conversation made it easy to justify listening in. 

They sat in silence, and Shiro was about to leave when he heard Rose ask, “How are you going to find them? Your family?”

“I don’t know, but I’ve got a few places to start looking.” Silence. “You gonna try to find your crew, if you can?”

“There’s no trying. I’ll find them.” 

“And if you can’t find ‘em?”

“I’ll keep looking until I do.”

“That’s not what I’m asking, Rose.” A pause. “What if they didn’t make it?”

“I can’t think that way.”

“You need to prepare yourself.” Matak’s voice was stern.

“I _can’t,_ Matak. People are dead because of me. And the only reason I let it keep happening was because I needed to find my friends. And if they’re gone— then I did it for no reason at all. I’m a monster and I don’t even have an excuse.”

Another pause, longer this time. Then Matak said, “You’re not a monster. Just a little broken, like the rest of us. You saved my broken hide, at least.”

Shiro remembered Sendak’s words to him when he’d been captured, and what he’d said to Sendak in return: _“You’re a broken soldier, you can’t hold out forever.”_ He’d realized at some point that it must have been something the Galra had said to him. He wondered if Matak had heard the same thing. 

Rose didn’t answer. After a moment, Matak spoke again. “The crazy man with the moustache told me to find him later and we’d trade stories and curse Zarkon. Want to come? I think he’s got nunville.”

“What the hell is nunville?”

“Dunno, but it sounded like it’ll get you sloshed.” 

“I still can’t eat most food, Matak.”

“It’ll get you sloshed quicker then.”

“Go have fun. I’m going to bed. Need a hand up?”

“Rose, sit with us a while. At least show me how to get to the kitchen.”

“Fine. Lemme up and I’ll give you a hand.” He heard a few grunts from around the corner. 

“Ah, Shiro!” Coran called, coming around the corner. Though Shiro managed to keep a straight face, he felt embarrassment pricking in his stomach as the sounds of movement around the corner stopped. His cover was blown.

“Just the paladin I was looking for!” Coran continued, oblivious. “I invited Matak to join me for a spot of nunville. Old soldiers and all that. Care to join us?” 

Shiro started to shake his head, but Coran interrupted. “Come now, Shiro! Just for a few doboshes!”

Shiro hesitated. But Coran was giving him a hopeful look, and it had been such a long day… “Sure, Coran.” 

“Excellent! Now just to find – there’s Matak! And Rose!” He added as the two came into view. “No nunville for you, but join us for a cup of tea?” Rose nodded.

Coran chattered as he led them to the kitchen, seeming not to notice the other three barely spoke. “Here we are! From the finest nunvillary around, courtesy of Kythylian Mu! And I’ve had some tea brewing as well.” He poured three cups of nunville and disappeared briefly into the kitchen, returning with an oversized cup of tea for Rose. In his absence, the three stood awkwardly by the table, Shiro decidedly looking anywhere but at Rose and Matak.

The Altean pulled out a chair for Rose with a gallant bow, then took the seat next to her at the head of the table. “Sit, sit!” Coran said. Shiro ended up next to Rose, with Matak sitting opposite her on Coran’s other side. “Now, a celebration! To Voltron and its paladins!” 

Shiro blushed and muttered something about a team effort as Rose and Matak lifted their cups. Rose clinked her cup against Coran’s, and both Matak and Coran looked at her with surprise. She glanced from one to the other, asking “Is that not what you do?”

“We just say ‘to so and so’ and drink,” Coran answered. “But if this is what earthlings do, we can touch the cups!” 

“Clink glasses. We say ‘clinking glasses,’” Shiro added. He tapped his against Rose’s, then Matak’s and Coran’s. 

“But these aren’t made of glass, why would we – no matter. In any case, enjoy the nunville!” Coran said, taking a sip. 

Shiro reminded himself not to grimace as he lifted the glass, but he was pleasantly surprised by the taste. What had Lance been complaining about? Thinking about Lance reminded him -- “Coran,” he asked, “why just us? Why not Allura or the others?”

Coran paused, frowning thoughtfully at his cup. After a long moment, he answered, “All you paladins have seen war, and terrible things. But you three –” he gestured broadly at the table – “have seen a bit more. Don’t think I haven’t noticed how you try to keep the worst from the other paladins, Shiro. It’s admirable, but I thought you might appreciate having an evening where you don’t need to be so careful.” He turned to Matak, the lighter look on his face indicating he was changing the subject. “So what is your plan of attack for finding your family when you leave us?” 

Without hesitation Matak launched into a list of systems he was planning to check, none of which Shiro recognized. Coran offered suggestions and occasionally a contact (“If Plackax Rid N’yalshup’s swavithra is still on Arst, they might have some information on the Wegu System that could help you there!”) Rose seemed content to listen, and Shiro tried to do the same. 

Halfway through his cup of nunville, when Shiro had started to feel a little lightheaded, and Coran and Matak were engrossed in a lively conversation about an “authentic Ulilu swap moon” in Matak’s home system, Rose quietly asked, “So how much did you hear?”

Shiro started. “Enough,” he answered, keeping his voice as low as hers. Because of the nunville, _and only because of the nunville,_ he added, “I heard you call yourself a monster.” Rose’s expression didn’t change, but he thought her hands tightened on her mug. “I feel the same way, sometimes,” he finished awkwardly. He looked at his Galra hand, remembering how Rose had shrunk away from it when they’d first met. 

Rose followed his gaze. Hesitantly, she asked, “Could I take a look at your arm?” When Shiro hesitated, she added, “I’m just curious. You can say no if it makes you uncomfortable.”

It was true Shiro didn’t like the thought of anyone examining the Galra limb (and particularly not a stranger), but it was also true that they knew almost nothing about it. Any information Rose could offer would be an improvement over what little they knew. After another moment, he said, “Sure,” and lay his forearm flat on the table between them. 

Hesitantly, Rose cupped his palm in one hand and ran the fingers of the other along Shiro’s forearm, gently tracing the edges of the metal plates. Shiro felt his face heating up – it was an odd, vulnerable sort of contact. “That tickles,” he protested when she rotated his arm and skimmed a finger along the inside of the elbow joint.

She looked at him in mild surprise. “Really? That’s a really good sensory feed, then.”

“It doesn’t tickle, exactly,” Shiro clarified, struggling to put the sensation into words. “It’s more like I sense the touch, and my brain registers that, if I still had my arm, it _would_ tickle, so it comes across as tickling. Does that make sense?”

Rose nodded, looking thoughtful. “I think so. I don’t know how the Druids do it, and I’m not sure I want to, but their synthetic nervous system technology is so far beyond anything we’ve even imagined on Earth.” She wrapped her thumb and forefinger around a point a few inches below his elbow. “I’m guessing the…amputation point…is about here?” She stumbled slightly over describing the trauma. 

“You’re close,” Shiro said, moving her hand a little closer to the elbow joint.

“And the feedback is different above and below that point?” she asked. She’d recovered, and her voice had regained that almost clinical quality he’d noticed sometimes. 

Shiro nodded. “Above that spot, it’s like…it still feels like my arm, just dulled, like I’m sensing things through a thick sweater. Below that, it’s more mechanical. I don’t really know how to describe it.”

Rose hummed and continued examining the limb. “Data port?” she asked, sliding a finger along the thicker rim that protected the delicate wrist joint. Shiro nodded again. Over her head he caught Coran’s eye. The Altean had paused in his conversation with Matak and gave Shiro a quick smile before diving back into what sounded like a serious debate over whether wokfrat was better pepper-fried or braised. Shiro felt himself blushing – it wasn’t quite a compromising position to be caught in, but it felt close. 

“So I know you can create an energy blade,” Rose said casually, rotating his hand so she could look at his palm and tracing the meeting points of the different plates there. Shiro reminded himself to exhale – his brain registered the sensation of Rose grazing her fingertips over the metal as more enjoyable than he’d expected. “Do you have any other functionality with it?”

“Not really. I guess I’ve melted metal with it.”

Rose looked up at him, eyes wide. “No. Way.”

Shiro chuckled to hear Rose sound like Lance or Hunk. “Yes, way.”

“That is _so cool_. I’ve never seen biotech that could do that.”

“Really? Because I got taunted one time for not having the latest model,” he answered, thinking of Sendak.

Rose rolled her eyes. “Let me guess. It was someone who had some kind of ludicrously overpowered, impractical weapon for an arm or something.” Shiro shrugged, and Rose nodded. “Thought so. It’s so silly. It seems like the rank-and-file Galra care more about form than function. The tech the gladiators have, that the Druids design, is all functional. But it’s like as soon as they let the soldiers have input, they want something ridiculous and it all goes to hell.” She gave him a hesitant look that was almost a smirk. “Who would have thought the conquerors of the known universe had horribly tacky taste in armor?”

Shiro surprised himself by grinning in return. “Maybe you’re right, but I didn’t care about tacky when I was getting my ass handed to me.”

She turned his hand over again and bent to take a closer look at the knuckle joints, her thumb smoothing over them one by one. Shiro caught his breath. How was that possibly so distracting? “You’re still here, so you can’t have done too badly.”

To help himself think clearly, he shook his head. “Pidge saved us, really. And Lance shot Sendak and gave Keith an opening to take him down. Hunk and Coran were escaping a Galra-controlled planet at the same time. They were all amazing.”

Rose looked up at him through her eyelashes. If he didn’t know better, he would have called it flirtatious. “Somehow I bet if I asked them about it, I’d get a different story,” she said, slowly. From that angle, Shiro couldn’t help but notice the touch of green in her eyes, and the full curve of her lips. 

She must have been pretty, before, he realized with a start. It was hard to be sure – she still looked sickly, and she seemed so uncomfortable around anyone but Matak. But he could imagine the damage her eyes could do if paired with that intriguing smirk he’d seen a flash of earlier. Or with a real smile.

Part of him wanted to see that. 

Shiro felt his face heat with embarrassment, again. He cleared his throat awkwardly. “You might. They’ll probably tell you something about how I got captured.”

Rose looked up from his arm with wide eyes, seeming to forget she still held his hand in both of hers. “You were captured again?”

He paused. “Not for long.”

Rose’s fingers tightened on his. “You must have been terrified.”

Shiro blinked. He had been. But in all the chaos of trying to keep Lance safe, the fight to regain the castle, and freeing the Balmera afterward, he’d buried the fear. And it had stayed there, until…

Until he’d been left with nothing else to think about.

Shiro took another breath. He loved his team. He’d die for any of them, if it meant keeping them safe. He wasn’t sure of the limits of what he’d do for Keith, but death was on the near side. But still – 

None of them had understood that being captured again by Sendak was his worst fear realized. Maybe it took another captive to understand it. 

Maybe he and Rose had more in common than he’d thought.

Something from his thoughts must have showed on his face, because Rose quickly dropped his arm, looking away. “Anyway, it’s…a really good model. Probably one of the better ones I’ve seen.” After a second, she added, “Someone wanted to make sure you had the best.”

Shiro couldn’t keep his mouth from twisting into a grimace. “They wanted to make sure I had the best after they cut off my hand. How thoughtful.”

Rose winced. “You’re right. I’m sorry, it’s really twisted. I don’t even know what I was trying to say.”

He shook his head. “Don’t worry about it. That information might be useful sometime.” 

Rose scowled. “I hope not.” She glanced at Coran and Matak, who were still engaged in debate, though their speech was more slurred and their gestures wilder. “I should get some sleep. Enjoy your nunville, whatever the hell it is.” For half a second, Shiro considered asking her to stay, though he couldn’t articulate why.

Matak looked over as Rose stood up. “Leaving us?” 

“Getting some sleep. You won’t leave without saying goodbye, will you?”

Matak smiled. “Wouldn’t dream of it, Rose.” Rose nodded to Coran, then left. Shiro watched her leave, and to his embarrassment caught Matak’s gaze. He still couldn’t read the big Uthralit’s expressions, but if he were pressed he’d have to call the look Matak was giving him “wary.” 

“She’s a good girl. You two will have to keep her safe for me,” Matak said, pouring Shiro another cup.

Shiro snorted – that was the nunville talking. “If she’d let us. She keeps saying she’s going to find her crew.”

“Doesn’t surprise me. She says they’re her family.” Matak paused. “When I met her, Androj – this other old gladiator at the prison, like me – when he introduced us, I told her I’d seen someone like her in the arena. I was thinking of you, Champion, but she thought I was talking about her crew. She lit up like a Fluxilite nebula.”

 _That_ was new information. Shiro had to work to keep the surprise from his face. So Rose had known there were other humans in Zarkon’s power before she’d been rescued. Specifically, she’d known about _him._ That was something worth thinking about. Later, he told himself, as he took a sip from the cup Matak had poured. The flavor was growing on him.

“And you fought in Zarkon’s gladiator arena as well?” Coran asked, pouring himself another cup. 

Matak nodded. “Until I busted the second leg. After the first one they gave me the tech and sent me back. When I busted the second one they sent me to the prison to die there instead. Two strikes and you’re out, I suppose. I wouldn’t have made it if Rose didn’t keep my tech running.” After a moment, he added, “I never fought you, Champion. If you were wondering.” His face broke into a smile that Shiro would almost call bitter. “If I had, I wouldn’t be here now.”

Shiro stiffened. He hated the sound of his old nickname, and knowing that he killed everyone he faced in the arena. “I wasn’t wondering.”

Matak shrugged. “Rose said you don’t remember much.” 

“I don’t.” He tried to keep his distaste for the conversation from coming through in his voice, but he wasn’t successful.

Matak gave him a look that Shiro couldn’t understand. “Fair enough.”

“Do you know anything that could help us? We have a lot of trouble getting good information about the Empire. Even the smallest thing might help.”

Matak paused and took another sip of nunville. It didn’t seem to have as much of an effect on him as it did on Shiro. Then again, he also topped Shiro by a good two feet. “I’ve been in that prison for quite a while now, Champion. We don’t get much news out there.” After a moment, he added, “From what we heard, the Empire had a setback a few months ago at a place called Khafra. But that’s all the news we got.”

Shiro nodded. He couldn’t remember whether the quadrant they’d lured Zarkon to had been named Khafra – the name did sound familiar – but he could check later. “That’s helpful. Thank you.”

“Anything to take down the Empire.” He raised his glass again. “To Voltron, and the end of Zarkon!” And then Coran raised his glass, and Shiro had no choice but to do the same, and even though he knew he would regret it in the morning, they all had another glass of nunville, and then what the hell one more, and somehow Coran made sure Shiro got back to his room without issue.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Oh my gosh I can't believe it's been a month since I updated. This chapter gave me FITS, friends. I don't know what it was, but somehow this chapter left me having problems.
> 
> In any case, I clearly did not meet my goal of publishing the whole thing before Season 3. I considered trying to wrestle this ridiculous piece of self-indulgence into canon compliance, but then kind of went...fuck that? I had this planned out, and am sticking with the plan. So if canon compliance is a thing you care about, consider this canon divergence after season 2 (but also? This will clearly never be anything remotely resembling canon compliant?)
> 
> Also, it's amazing to me how many people are enjoying this ridiculous piece of self-indulgence I started for stress relief. Thank you SO MUCH for your comments and kudos and bookmarks. It makes my day every time I get an email notification. So THANK YOU for taking the time, and I hope you enjoy! 
> 
> I'm on [tumblr](https://sunlit-capybara.tumblr.com/) sometimes too! 
> 
> Final note: I fixed a typo in the previous chapter, very close to the end. Lines that were attributed to Hunk should have been attributed to Shiro. Sorry about that!


	7. Chapter 6

He couldn’t say how, but when he woke up with a pounding headache, Shiro knew it was late. Checking his ticker only confirmed that he had, indeed, slept through his morning exercise, breakfast, and team drills. Thinking all sorts of curses at himself, he changed out of yesterday’s clothes and sprinted to the training room as fast as his hungover body would let him.

Keith was the only person there, taking on two of the gladiators at a higher level than Shiro remembered him trying before. Shiro’s eyes darted to follow Keith’s movements as he switched seamlessly between one robot and the other, using his bayard to block their larger weapons seemingly without effort. 

Keith had always been good, but Shiro wondered with a pang how he’d gotten _that_ good. 

The second gladiator’s staff went flying, and with his sword at the joins of his neck Keith called, “End training sequence.” He turned toward the door as his bayard vanished into air (Shiro couldn’t help feeling a little jealous at how _easy_ it was for him). As soon as he saw Shiro he smirked. 

“Have fun last night?” 

Groaning, Shiro dropped to the floor by the wall nearby. “What do you know?”

Keith’s smirk only grew wider. “Not much, just that Coran said you were _indisposed._ ”

“I _was_ indisposed.”

“You were shitfaced.” Keith said it without inflection or judgement, and after a moment’s consideration Shiro chose not to argue. 

“What about training?”

“I led. It went fine.” 

Of course it did – Keith was a born leader, even if he didn’t see himself that way. Shiro had never doubted that he’d be the decisive head Voltron needed. Besides, Keith had led training while he’d been gone, and it had been fine then, too, Shiro remembered. Remembering the team had been fine without him – even though that had been what he’d wanted, and he was glad they had been – still stung at odd moments, sometimes. He missed what they had, even if they’d sort-of recreated it now. Keith had been happy to hand the role and the Black Lion back over to him, but there were still moments when Shiro wondered if Keith wasn’t second-guessing Shiro’s leadership.

“So how does nunville taste? I never had any.” Keith wondered, dropping to the ground next to Shiro. Shiro thought Keith was enjoying this entirely too much. 

A sudden wave of nausea hit him at the memory of nunville. Reeling, he put his head in his hands; it was just him and Keith, and Keith had seen him in worse states.

“Not bad. I wish it tasted worse.”

“What did you even get up to last night anyway?”

“Nothing interesting.” 

“You’re not getting off that easy.”

“Really nothing. It was just Coran, me, Matak and Rose.”

“Interesting company.” From the tone, Shiro guessed Keith was frowning.

“Not really.” He tried to fumble through the disjointed memories of the previous evening. “We complained about Zarkon. Someone said the Empire had problems at Khafra. Rose looked at my hand.”

“She what?” Shiro knew Keith too well -- he didn’t even need to lift his head to know that Keith was staring at him in surprise, probably edged with the protectiveness that showed whenever Shiro’s imprisonment came up. 

“She asked and I let her. I thought she might be able to tell me something.”

“And what did she tell you?” Keith’s voice was murderously even.

“That it was sensible. She knew I had a data port. She was surprised I could melt metal. Like I said. Nothing interesting.”

After a moment, Keith said, “You missed the other people in the pods waking up. We sent them off this morning. They didn’t know much interesting, either. Allura interviewed them. Matak and Xera left too.” 

Shiro nodded. “So that just leaves Rose.”

Another pause. Then Keith said, “There were a few strange things. No one but Matak had any biotech.”

“Not that odd, but you’re right, it’s interesting,” Shiro muttered. 

“And Rose stayed in her room all morning.”

“She and Xera didn’t get along.” To put it mildly.

“Why?”

“Xera said she killed prisoners for their tech.” Shiro felt a little more stable, so he sat up. He’d been right -- Keith was frowning. 

“That might explain why everyone was so eager to leave. Do you think it’s true?”

Shiro considered. “I doubt it. Xera didn’t seem to have any good information about anything else, so it’s possible their information about Rose’s actions is wrong as well. When Pidge asked Rose whether it was true, she had a reasonable explanation.” 

Keith’s gaze was fixed at the gladiator lying immobile on the floor, thoughtful. “Still. It’s strange. And not good. Especially if there was a rumor she killed people with Galra tech and now she’s acting weirdly interested in yours.”

“Keith.” Shiro’s voice was tired. 

“You don’t think she’s a threat? Then why are you so eager to get her off the ship?”

“Not because she’s a threat. I don’t want to put any more people in danger than I have to. And having her on board is one more variable we have to account for.” Keith had been in his position – Shiro thought he should have known that more variables made any plans less certain, especially an unknown like a stranger roaming free in their home base. 

Keith paused, his mouth tight. “Well, we don’t have to worry about it right now. Rose took Coran up on using one of the cryopods.”

Shiro shrugged. “Probably good.”

“It took awhile for Coran and Allura to convince her.”

Shiro snorted. “Doesn’t surprise me she didn’t want to be knocked out by strangers for a few days.”

Keith crossed his arms. “We saved her life. That should be enough for her to believe we won’t kill her in her sleep.”

“Give her time, Keith.” Though he didn’t want to, Shiro glanced at his Galra arm. “She’s been through a lot. She’s allowed to be cautious.” After a pause, he added, “When she knows us a little better, I bet she’ll trust us more.” And, he thought, she might be more willing to talk about what she knows.

**

Shiro blocked as Keith aimed a punch at his face, catching Keith’s arm and pulling the smaller man off-balance as he slid a leg in to trip him. “You put too much weight on your front leg,” he called as Keith hit the ground. Keith slapped the ground in frustration before taking Shiro’s offered hand and getting back to his feet. “Water break?” 

Keith didn’t answer, but walked with Shiro to grab a water pouch. “It’s been a long time since that worked on you,” Shiro said, trying to diffuse Keith’s angry silence.

After a beat, Keith answered, “I was thinking about other things. Didn’t keep my head in the game.”

Part of Shiro’s mind caught that the Keith he’d known from the Garrison would never use idioms that referenced sports – he picked that particular Earth-ism up in space. He tried to process the rest of Keith’s words at the same time. “Like what?”

“Like how we’re just _sitting_ here when we could be going after…whoever’s in charge now that Zarkon’s out of the picture.” He punctuated the words with a forceful sip from his water pouch.

Shiro agreed, but fueling Keith’s frustration wouldn’t do any good. “We’ve barely had a day off since I got back, and from what I hear before that you all were working nonstop. Is it so bad to have a quiet week?”

Keith looked at him skeptically. “It is when the universe needs saving.” Shiro opened his mouth to speak, and Keith cut him off: “I know, I know, patience yields focus.”

“It’s like you don’t even need me here anymore,” Shiro joked, grinning.

Keith started, and the look he gave Shiro was shocked and pained. “Don’t say that. _Never_ say that.” Shiro held up his hands in mock surrender, but Keith wasn’t having it. “I mean it, Shiro. Don’t talk like that. We need you.”

With a sardonic smile, Shiro added, “It seems like you got along fine without me.”

Keith’s glare didn’t hold an ounce of sympathy for Shiro’s self-pity. “We made it work, but we need you. Don’t act like we don’t.” After a moment, he added hesitantly, “You want to talk?”

Shiro shook his head. “There’s nothing to talk about.”

Keith crossed his arms. “Look, I can’t imagine what you went through. Or what it’s like, coming back and having everything being weird—”

Shiro shrugged him off with a smile. “I’m used to weird these days. I’m holding up fine.” He clapped Keith on the shoulder. “I just don’t want you to get used to being second-in-command.”

Keith stilled. “The Black Lion’s yours, Shiro. As long as you’re here, she’s yours.”

“Sure, but we’ve already established I’m a flight risk,” he added with grim humor.

Keith looked at him in disbelief. “Are you even taking this seriously?” Shiro could hear the edge of Keith’s temper flaring in the last few words.

He stifled a sigh and lay a hand on Keith’s shoulder. “Keith. Of course I am.” After a moment, he added, “I’m sorry. I shouldn’t joke.”

The red paladin huffed. “Yeah. You shouldn’t. But you do. So quit it.”

The coil of shame in Shiro’s stomach took him by surprise. Keith was right. He’d known, or at least guessed, how much his team felt the strain when he vanished – and he’d prodded anyway. 

“I think I’m done sparring for today,” Keith added, turning to the door. 

“Sure,” Shiro said, putting the hurt aside for later – there was work to do. “Pidge decoded some new data files, so I’ll go over those until dinner.” He followed Keith into the hall.

Keith nodded and took off for Red’s hangar. 

Shiro declined Pidge’s offer to look at the data together and curled up with a tablet in Black’s hangar. The more time he spent with Pidge’s information, the more his hopes of finding something useful sank. 

Quiet moments had always been few and far between, but now they were constant, piling on and weighing him down like stones. And now… nothing. There was nothing here that could help them. Yet again. 

He leaned his head back against Black’s leg and stifled a groan. He felt like he’d always had a trajectory – first it had been getting into the Garrison and on the Kerberos mission, then (he guessed) surviving the arena. With Voltron they’d only ever had to wait a few days before finding the next step forward. Even when Allura had been bedridden after she’d healed the Balmera, Coran had still found ways to keep them training, keep them moving. 

But now?

They didn’t even know what to strike. There was no information coming from within the Empire, not without Thace, and they were stalled. He’d been so sure taking down Zarkon would bring down the Empire – and yes, in retrospect it was hopelessly naïve. But he’d been so sure they’d win, he hadn’t thought about a trajectory for afterwards. 

And now, did Voltron even need him? 

Certainly not as much as he needed Voltron.

An alarm beeped on the new ticker Hunk had made him promise to wear. He’d gotten a thorough chewing-out for missing dinner a few days before, and Hunk had reappeared the next day with a ticker pre-set with meal-time alarms. Without an excuse, Shiro turned off the tablet and made his way back to the main castle.

Coran and Rose waited in the hallway near the dining room, Coran explaining something that Rose appeared to half-listen to. Shiro tried to smooth the surprise from his features – no one had mentioned that Rose was awake.

“Hello, Number One!” Coran called, interrupting himself. 

Rose gave Shiro a quick glance before looking back at the ground. Even with just a glimpse, the effect of the cryopods was clear. She still had an unnatural paleness under her skin tone, but the dark circles under her eyes were less noticeable, and the sickly pallor was gone.

“Feeling better?” Shiro asked. Rose nodded, but barely met his eyes. 

“Yes. Much. Coran wants me to stay a few more days, but I’ll be out of your way soon.”

“Indeed, Rigealian flatworms are a rather nasty parasite for most species, but I really have no idea how they affect your fragile human systems!” Coran added. “A few quintants should make it clear whether it’s a concern for long-term damage.”

Shiro frowned, wondering how Coran could sound cheerful while talking about parasites. “What are—”

Rose grimaced. “ _Please_ don’t ask.”

Shiro smothered a laugh. “That bad, huh?”

Rose lifted her eyebrows, looking slightly annoyed at Shiro’s amusement. “Bad dinnertime conversation. And I’m really looking forward to actual food for a change.” She took a deep breath, eyes closed, and then smoothed her features into a tentative smile. “Hunk said he’s been working on something special. He kicked us out of the dining room so it would be a surprise.”

Shiro returned the smile, his just as guarded. He hadn’t missed how she’d smothered her irritation. “You’re in for a treat, then. It’s good you’re feeling better.” 

Rose nodded. “It might be good to have a few more days before I leave, honestly. It’ll give me some time to make a plan.”

He considered for a moment. “So you’re still going to search for your crewmates?” She nodded again. After a pause, Shiro asked, “Do you even know where to start?”

“No, but I’ll figure it out.” 

“Are you sure that’s the best idea?” he asked, looking over her head to Coran for support. “You’re barely back on your feet.”

Rose shook her head. “I don’t want to wait any longer than I have to. They’re my team. I need to find them. I’m guessing you’d do the same.”

He remembered his own Garrison crew and felt his jaw tighten, wishing her words didn’t make him feel guilty. “I chose to stay with Voltron instead of looking for Matt and Commander Holt.” 

“No, I meant your team _here_ ,” she said hurriedly, gesturing at the castle. “I didn’t mean – that’s not what I was trying to—shit.” 

“We’re very glad to have Shiro here,” Coran added, just as quickly. “And we’re doing our best to find the Holts as we go.”

“Of course -- that came out wrong, I’m so sorry—” She sank back against the wall.

Shiro shrugged, doing his best to fake nonchalance. “Don’t worry.”

Rose didn’t look convinced, but Coran jumped into a discussion of what he and Hunk had found on their supply run a few days ago, jabbering on in a way that soothed some of the tension and at least distracted Shiro from his thoughts. “—and could you believe? A whole pouch of colizey seeds, just sitting there in the stall! It’s almost as if the seller didn’t know what they were! It was like finding luxite in a black hole!”

“Is that the Altean equivalent of ‘finding a needle in a haystack’?” Lance asked. Shiro had noticed his and Pidge’s approach, but hadn’t turned around. 

“My guess is more like ‘a diamond in the rough’,” Pidge said, not far behind Lance. “Is there a reason we’re all just standing here?”

“Hunk’s request,” Shiro answered indifferently. 

Lance slid toward Rose with a flirtatious smile. “Well, _you_ are a sight for sore eyes, aren’t you?”

Shiro rolled his eyes and growled, “ _Lance._ ” 

“I just meant it’s good she’s feeling better, jeez Shiro!”

“Sure,” Pidge deadpanned. “And you weren’t flirting with that pirate’s daughter on Adeena.”

“What happened on Adeena?” Shiro could feel a frown and a headache coming on.

“ _Nothing_ happened, we got out, it was just a misunderstanding! Keith,” Lance pleaded as Allura and Keith joined the group, “tell Shiro Adeena wasn’t my fault.”

Keith glanced at Shiro briefly, eyes hard. Shiro repressed a sigh. So Keith was still angry, then. “It actually wasn’t. And we wouldn’t have gotten out if you hadn’t thought of those ridiculous disguises.” After a pause, he added, “But you were flirting a little.”

Lance shrugged, a self-satisfied grin spreading across his features. “I can’t help it if the ladies like what they like.”

Allura groaned and pressed a hand to her forehead. “Can we please sit down to dinner like civilized people and cease this ridiculous discussion?”

“Hunk told us to wait out here, apparently,” Pidge answered. 

“Come on, really?” Keith protested. “We can’t just eat?”

“Take it up with Hunk, not me.” Pidge put her hands up in surrender.

As if summoned, the doors to the dining room opened just enough for Hunk to slide out sideways, looking inordinately pleased with himself. 

“What’s the big deal, Hunk? Why can’t we come in?” Keith asked, arms crossed.

“Patience, Keith,” Hunk answered. “All will be made clear in the fullness of time.” He turned to the rest of them. “So remember how Coran and I made that run to get supplies a couple days ago?” He didn’t wait for them to nod before continuing. “We stopped at the market there and I picked up a bunch of stuff. The guy I bought this stuff from promised it was going to be the best meal I ever had and gave me his great-grandma’s recipe – at least I think that’s what he said. Anyway, I made some adjustments, and voila!” He gestured and the doors to the dining room opened dramatically (Shiro wondered how he’d set that up), revealing the table already set artistically. 

“Dude, did you find candles?” Pidge asked in disbelief.

Hunk flapped a hand. “I might have used the downtime to rig up a few torches with a low setting and add a flickering mechanism, but it’s no big deal. Come in and eat before it gets cold -- I plated it for you already! Grab a seat!” Hunk led the way through the door and made an expansive gesture at the table. “And – bon appetit!” 

They made their way to the chairs. It was certainly colorful, Shiro thought, looking down at the plate. A mound of bright purple mash was artistically topped with a brilliant green sauce, which itself was speckled with small red vegetables that reminded Shiro of very tiny cherry tomatoes. 

“Very impressive, Hunk,” Allura said cheerfully, taking a seat. “I can see why this took all afternoon. I never would have thought to make the blitroot into a paste.”

“It’s not really a paste, it’s more like a mash. I was thinking mashed potatoes,” he added for the benefit of the earthlings. 

“Yeah, that’s what it reminds me of!” Lance said excitedly as they all settled in. “It smells great - I can’t wait to try it! Dude, you are gonna run the best restaurant in the galaxy someday!”

Shiro scooped up a spoonful. The texture was a little odd, a mix of crunchy and soft, but the taste was pleasant enough. He was absorbed enough in the food that it took him a few moments to notice everyone else was oddly quiet. 

“It’s…very…unique,” Allura said after a swallow. 

“It’s interesting,” Pidge agreed. “How did you manage to keep the hard bits in?”

Hunk shrugged. “They just wouldn’t cook down.”

Keith nodded. “Huh. It kinda reminds me of…” Another swallow. “When you’re eating fish and get a bone. Accidentally.”

Lance gagged. 

Hunk moaned, flinging his head and arms on the table. “It’s not really _that_ bad, is it?”

Pidge looked uncomfortable. “Sorry, it kind of is. It’s just really…gross.”

Lance wrinkled his nose. “Hunk, buddy, you know I think you’re the best cook in the universe-- except for my mom, of course. But this is _not_ one of your successes.”

Hunk’s shoulders drooped. “You guys didn’t taste it before I changed the recipe – it was inedible.” He sighed wistfully. “You should’ve heard the way this dude talked about this meal, and it had this amazing toasted rice and cardamom aroma when I finished the mash. But then I added the last ingredients and it all went wrong! I was hoping the flavor of these little red things would offset the bitterness of the purple starchy thing. And your palates aren’t exactly refined – no offense – so I thought I might get away with it.”

“It’s okay, Hunk,” Pidge comforted. “Every invention can’t be a Tesla coil.”

Shiro took another bite. “I think it’s fine.”

Everyone at the table, even Coran, gave him a disbelieving look. 

Hunk gestured at Shiro. “And my point is proven.”

Shiro shrugged. “What? It’s not bad.”

“Yeah, but you also think the mac and cheese at the Garrison cafeteria is delicious,” Keith countered. 

“The mac and cheese at the cafeteria _is_ delicious,” Shiro said flatly.

“No, man, it is most definitely not.” Hunk grimaced. “It tastes like—like – I don’t even know how to describe it—”

“Plastic that’s been soaked in lake water,” Rose cut in, to Shiro’s surprise. She hadn’t spoken since her flustered apology. “And the noodles are somehow really floppy and also still hard.”

Hunk nodded in agreement. “Yes! Thank you, Rose. Lake-water plastic.”

Shiro frowned. “It does not. It’s good.”

Rose lifted her eyebrows. “I’d rather eat a lifetime of Galra prison rations with this green sauce than Garrison mac and cheese _once_.” 

Everyone got very still. Coran coughed, while the others avoided looking at her.

Rose glanced around, noticing the tension. “What? It was a joke.” She looked down at her plate, suddenly uncomfortable. “Sorry.”

Shiro felt embarrassed on her behalf, remembering the flat reception his many gallows-humor jokes had gotten (even though they were objectively hilarious). He gave a chuckle that he hoped didn’t sound too forced. “I don’t know about Galra prison rations, but I bet this green sauce would be good on the mac and cheese.”

Lance pretended to retch. “Dude, are you _trying_ to make me hurl?”

“No, I’m trying to plan a menu.” He squinted at his spoonful of purple starchy mush. “Rose, you’re the expert– Galra prison rations or Garrison Thanksgiving?” 

After a pause, she gave him a small smile. “Garrison Thanksgiving wasn’t so bad. The stuffing was pretty good. I’d take Thanksgiving over rations any day.” 

Pidge groaned. “But the stuffing was so _dry_. You had to douse it in gravy and chug five glasses of water after every bite.”

“That’s just you and your weird thing about dry foods, Pidge,” Hunk said. “No one else had to refill their cup every two minutes at lunch.”

“Hydration is important!”

“Okay, okay, but here’s the real question – green sauce or Balmeran cave bug stew?” Lance asked, grinning.

“Ugh, cave bugs, for sure.” Keith said. 

“You have got to be kidding me! You would eat cave bugs over _anything_ Hunk made?” 

As the discussion devolved into a heated argument (and Coran disappeared to the kitchen, returning with bowls of space goo), Rose caught Shiro’s eye and mouthed “thank you.” Shiro smiled – a little less guarded this time – and turned to Allura next to him, pointing at her plate. “Are you going to finish that?”

**

The castle alarm sounded a little before Shiro’s own alarm was set to go off. He recognized the pattern without thinking – it wasn’t the emergency alarm, but what Pidge called the “wake up we’ve got shit to do” alarm. No need to rush to the bridge, then, but Shiro was still in his armor and at the bridge in less than thirty ticks. “Did we pick up a distress call?” he asked Allura, who was already standing at her pilot’s dais. 

She nodded, her eyes on the star map open above her. “A moon colony in a nearby system.”

Shiro frowned. “And you just happened to be awake to hear it in the middle of the night. Are we responding?”

Allura ignored his commentary in favor of answering the question. “We’ll get the teludav running as soon as Coran gets here.”

Shiro hesitated. “Will it do any good if I tell you that you need to get more rest?”

“I get plenty of rest,” Allura answered, her tone warning him to drop it.

Shiro didn’t plan on backing down easily. “Princess,” he said gently. “I know you worry because we don’t know what’s going on in the Empire, but we have to take care of ourselves so we can keep fighting.”

Allura gave him a piercing look. “Do we, Shiro.” She wasn’t asking a question. “It seems to me that you’ve looked quite tired lately yourself.”

“I’m doing fine,” Shiro replied evenly. 

“Chulatt told me you’ve been training during sleeping hours ten out of the last fourteen nights.”

Shiro stilled. “Are you having your mice _follow_ me?” He tried to keep the indignation out of his voice – from Allura’s pursed lips, he hadn’t succeeded. 

“I am not. They happen to notice things, and tell me.” 

There was the tell-tale fizz of anger between his shoulder blades, warning him to get control before it spread and he lost control. Shiro inhaled and forced himself to hold it for a second before continuing. “Tell your mice that if they should _happen_ to notice my whereabouts to keep it to themselves.”

“Shiro, you’re the Black Paladin—”

“I’m still entitled to privacy.” Keeping his tone even was a struggle.

“Your friends are allowed to be concerned about you! Especially when you’re acting—”

“Um…” Both Shiro and Allura whipped their heads to the doorway, where Rose stood, looking uncertain. “Sorry, I heard the alarms and wasn’t sure…”

Allura sighed, glancing at Shiro in irritation. “There’s a bench along the back wall. Take a seat there.” Under her breath, she added, “She can stay as long as she stays _there_.” She turned back to the controls, pointedly not looking at Shiro.

Watching the map of the system shimmer into display, Shiro already started to feel the rush of adrenaline and worry as he considered the situation they were heading into. He started running through potential formations – they wouldn’t be able to plan anything for sure without more details, of course, but Lance’s flying _had_ been improving, the asteroid incident notwithstanding, and Shiro was wondering if the Blue Lion’s balanced skill set would work well in tandem with Black’s – the Black and Blue lions had never had a mission with just the two of them, with either Shiro or Keith flying Black – and he wondered if Pidge had finished adding the cloaking ability to any of the other lions yet – he wanted to know if they could expand the cloaking for something as massive as the castle, especially if they had civilians on board –

Startling himself out of his train of thought, Shiro glanced back at Rose, remembering his conversation with Coran about Rose staying aboard. Rose sat ram-rod straight and clutched the edge of the bench, lips tight with anxiety. Biting his cheek to keep a straight face, he strode over to find out what was the matter.

Rose glanced at him, then asked tightly, “Is something happening?”

She had no idea what was going on, he realized. “We picked up a distress call. We’re going to answer it. It might be nothing.”

Her shoulders loosened. “So we’re not in danger?”

Shiro shook his head, and Rose let out a long exhale. Shiro considered moving back to the center of the room to continue consulting with Allura, but the thought of the princess asking her mice to spy on him kept him in place, standing silently next to Rose and trying to beat down a surge of indignation.

“I didn’t mean to eavesdrop earlier,” Rose said suddenly. 

Shiro glanced at her, wondering if she was remembering that he’d listened in on her conversation with Matak a few days before, but she kept her eyes on the floor. “I didn’t think it was intentional,” he answered. 

 

He thought Rose was about to say something else, only to stop when Keith entered; like Shiro, he already wore his armor. The red paladin glanced from Allura’s stiff shoulders and back muscles in taut lines under her uniform, to Shiro, who stood with his arms crossed and looked anywhere but at Allura. 

“What’s going on?” he asked, frowning. Shiro wondered if he was the only one who noticed Keith might be asking about several things.

Allura answered without looking up from the command station. “We only know that someone activated a planet-wide distress signal. It’s unclear if this is a matter for Voltron, but we do know that this planet was attacked by the Galra several decafeebs ago and has been under Galra control for quite some time. 

Keith nodded tersely. “Shiro, you want to lead this one?”

He frowned. “You don’t want to?”

Keith shook his head, his mouth set in a stubborn line. Shiro considered arguing, but the look in Keith’s eyes told him it would be pointless to try. “All right. I’ll take the Black Lion, you take the Red Lion. Princess –”

“I will stay with the castle. We might need the teludav in a hurry if things go wrong.” It was impossible to miss the clipped edge to her tone, and Shiro bit back a sigh. 

Keith move to stand next to him. “You all right?” he asked quietly. 

_No,_ he wanted to say. Keith was doggedly rejecting being the leader Shiro knew he could be, Allura _didn’t trust him—_

_Breathe,_ he told himself, interrupting the train of thought. He could be angry later. For now, they had work to do.

“Fine.” He forced a smile and clapped Keith’s shoulder. “Looks like we’ve got something to do.”

Keith gave him a half-smile, but it didn’t reach his eyes. “Guess so.”

**

Several of the hairy, frog-looking locals met the Paladins when they landed. They’d managed to find a planet that hadn’t heard of Voltron, so Shiro went through the tedious necessities of explaining who they were and offering their help. They left to huddle and discuss for a moment, looking furtively over their shoulders at the Paladins. 

The air was stiflingly humid. “Pidge, what’s the read on the environment?” Shiro asked.

“It’s safe for humans.”

He sighed in relief, popping off his helmet. “Good. I might’ve risked it anyway.”

Hunk followed suit. “I _hate_ these hot, wet planets. Give me a dry desert any day.”

Pidge snorted. “Yeah, that’s not what you said whenever we had wilderness survival seminars at the Garrison.”

Keith’s eyes narrowed, focused on the group of aliens still deep in conversation. “What’s going on over there?”

“What do you mean? They’re still talking about whether they _want_ our help or not. Dumb question, if you ask me,” Lance answered.

“No, one of them looked back over here and then the conversation got all…frazzled.”

“Frazzled?” Lance asked skeptically.

“Just…more lively. I don’t know.”

Shiro shrugged, but the aliens were walking back before he could answer. 

“We’ve considered your offer. And we will gladly accept your help,” the one who seemed to be in charge said. “A band of twenty renegades has kidnapped our chief alchemists. Without the alchemists, we will not be able to predict the movements of our lands.”

“Um, movements?” Hunk asked in confusion.

Pidge answered as the leader opened his mouth. “It looks like this planet sees a lot of seismic activity.”

Hunk stifled a groan. “Not like Taujeer, right? Tell me this place isn’t about to blow.”

“No, not like Taujeer,” Pidge responded absently, inputting values into the computer housed in the forearm of her armor. “But there could be a big earthquake coming. Maybe…thirty doboshes from now?”

One of the aliens gasped. “You can read the movements with your craft? But if you can predict the movements, would you teach us—ahh!” One of his companions had elbowed him hard in the side.

“Please, great Paladins,” the leader said, his voice booming. “We seek only our alchemists’ safe return. Your craft is fascinating,” he continued with a nod to Pidge – “but it is not our way.”

Shiro suppressed his own groan. They weren’t all that common, but aliens who rejected technology especially irked him for some reason. However, being a paladin was being part-diplomat, he reminded himself. “We understand. Where do you think your alchemists were taken?”

“The caves of Dus’wan.” He pointed at an imposing mountain range in the distance. The leader turned back to him, examining him with unsettling eyes – it had to be the pinhole pupils that made Shiro feel so…discombobulated. 

“We’ll do our best to find them,” he said, turning back to the other paladins. “Let’s go!”

**

“Ah- _ha!_ ” Lance crowed as an alien poked its head out of the cave, then retreated inside. “Finally!” 

“That cave’s pretty small,” Keith observed.

“Doesn’t look like we can use the lions,” Hunk volunteered. 

Shiro suppressed a sigh – he’d hoped he’d get a chance to fly more with Black today. “I guess not. Ask your lions to put their shields up, everyone. We’ll go in on foot.”

Lions shielded, the Paladins approached the caves and hid behind a boulder. “What’s our plan?” Keith asked quietly.

“Go in, beat people up, free the alchemists,” Lance answered.

“That’s it?”

Lance rolled his eyes. “There’s twenty of them and five of us. It’s not like they have super-advanced weapons technology on this planet. We’ve all dealt with worse on our own.”

Keith wasn’t convinced. “Shiro?”

“Lance is right. This should be a relatively easy rescue. The leader said there were only twenty outlaws in this group, and we know from the Blue Lion’s scan that the cave is small and shallow. We should be able to corner them and rescue the prisoners quickly.”

Hunk shouldered his cannon. “Man, it’s been so long since we’ve had an old-fashioned fight like this. No crazy plans, no robeasts – it feels like the good old days!”

Shiro couldn’t help grinning. “I thought the good old days were nothing _but_ crazy plans and robeasts.”

Hunk readjusted the heavy weapon. “Come on, Shiro, let me have my nostalgia and pretend this Paladin thing used to be simpler.”

Shiro ignored Hunk in favor of taking out his bayard and concentrating on forming it into a sword. He’d found swords generally worked well for him. “Everyone ready?” he asked.

He glanced at the team – Lance and Hunk had their weapons out, ready to lead the charge with a hail of warning shots. Keith had shifted his weight to the balls of his feet, ready to sprint in with cat-like agility and start taking down individual opponents. 

Except Pidge’s bayard was still sheathed and she was frowning at something from her armor’s input screen. 

“Pidge?” Wondering what distracted her cost Shiro his concentration, and the bayard grew heavy in his hand. Shiro suppressed a frustrated groan and looked up from the enormous spiked flail that replaced the sword he’d wanted, only to find Keith, Lance, and Hunk staring at him. “What?”

“Still having trouble with it?” Hunk asked after a pause. 

Shiro grimaced. He could work with the bayard – he just needed time. He was the Black Paladin, it was _his_ bayard after all. It was his struggle, not his team’s. 

“It’s finnicky. Sometimes it’s hard to keep my concentration,” he answered with a shrug. 

Keith frowned. “Maybe you should talk to Allura? None of us had as much trouble with ours.”

Shiro shook it off. “It’s not a big deal. I’m just getting used to it. Pidge, are you ready?”

Pidge looked up in surprise. “Sorry. I thought I noticed an anomaly, but it’s not relevant.”

“Right. Let’s go.” He pulled the bayard into a more usable shape, and they snuck silently to the cave’s entrance. After a quick survey – it was all too dark to see that far – Shiro nodded and they headed into the shadows. 

“Are we sure they’re here?” Lance whispered after they’d trekked several hundred feet in the darkness.

Shiro opened his mouth to answer when a flare blinded him momentarily. He tensed and prepared to strike, blinking through the spots the blinding light left on his eyes, only to feel the warning heat of a laser coming too close to his neck. 

Light flooded the cave, revealing close to a hundred local soldiers with their weapons trained on them, and each of the paladins with a laser weapon to their throat.

“Yeah, I think they’re here,” Keith muttered. 

**

“Okay, so this didn’t go great,” Lance cracked, struggling against the restraints that kept his wrists behind his back and hobbled his ankles. “Maybe next time we get a distress call we check if they’re _lying liars who lie_ before we offer to help?”

“Lance,” Shiro growled, hoping he kept the edge of panic from his voice. _He was captured again, he was tied up, he couldn’t move…_

He bit his lip to distract himself from his spiraling thoughts. He’d been captured before. He’d gotten out. He could survive this. He _had_ to. The others were depending on him. They could find a way out. He just needed to be patient and _think._

He should have paid more attention when Pidge mentioned the anomaly. How was he supposed to know this backwards planet had somehow acquired technology to fool sonic sensors, or that the cave the locals had directed them to was actually an underground amphitheater filled with soldiers ready to betray Voltron? 

_That wouldn’t help now._ Now they needed to get out. 

“Any ideas?” he asked.

“Well, they took our bayards,” Pidge said calmly. “They also took our helmets, so they’ve got our comms line with the ship and the tracking mechanism there. If we’re lucky, Allura and Coran will notice that the tracking mechanisms in our suits are in different places from the helmets and figure something’s wrong.”

He tried to focus on his surroundings, what his resources were, but his brain kept defaulting to _can’t move, can’t breathe._ “What do we have?”

“Not much,” Keith answered. “Our suits, but we can’t do much without the bayards or the helmets.” 

“Does Galra-Keith have his knife?” Hunk asked hopefully.

“There’s no place for it in my suit.”

They didn’t have long, the guards could be back any minute – _“ship you off to the Emperor, see what he does with a traitor like you",_ they’d said, coupled with a few kicks to his gut. He didn’t want to think about his odds of escaping from a Galra battle cruiser a second time. And what they’d do with him – it would probably involve that witch again, and finishing whatever she’d started with his hand—

His hand. That was something. 

“I have an idea. But I need someone to trust me.”

There was a moment where no one spoke, before Lance said, “You mean more than we already do, man?”

“Look. It’s not the best idea,” Shiro answered. “I think I can activate the energy blade on my hand and cut through someone’s restraints, but I’d be doing it blind.”

“I’ll do it,” Keith said, without hesitation.

“Holy crow, you are _both_ insane,” Lance said hotly. 

“Do we have another option?” Keith retorted.

“That’s a really hot thing that can _cut through metal_ that’s going to be aiming for the ropes around your wrists, Mullet! I vote no.”

“If Shiro says he can do it, I believe him.”

Lance growled; Keith met his glare impassively. “Fine. But I’m driving.”

Shiro did his best to ignore the wild panic in his chest as he scooted backward towards Keith, who mirrored his movements until they were back-to-back. “You sure about this?” Shiro whispered, half-hoping Keith would back out and knowing with certainty he wouldn’t. 

“Of course I am,” Keith answered. “Let’s just get out of here.”

“Okay, Keith, lift your hands up – straight up – I said _straight,_ dude – there. Hold still. Shiro, if you start up your blade – yep, like that – now move up and back. Not too fast – slow down! There, another inch, don’t move more than – stopstopstop!” He heard an exhale, and glanced over his shoulder to see Keith leaning down to untie his ankles. 

Shiro let his chin fall to his chest for a moment, and when he looked up Lance was looking at him intently. “You okay, man?” 

“Fine,” Shiro answered as Keith undid the rope around his wrists. He reached forward to free his legs, and soon all of them were on their feet. 

“So what now?” Hunk asked. “Can you cut through the door?”

Shiro tried, but his arm blade stopped hard against the door. He tried again. “This should work,” he muttered. He tried once more for good measure, banging his arm against the door in frustration. 

Pidge groaned, fingers flitting over the reader in her suit’s forearm. “It’s tempered with that anglesium stuff. I don’t think you’ll be able to get through it.”

“So we’re not tied up, but we’re still stuck,” Lance said, crossing his arms. “Is there any way we can get them to open the door so we can rush them? I bet we could take ‘em if we could surprise them.”

Shiro shook his head. “Why would they open the door? It sounded like they were planning to leave us here until they transport us. Maybe that’s our best shot.”

“That could be days, though,” Keith argued. “We need some way to get them to open it—”

“What if we made a lot of noise?” Hunk asked hesitantly. 

Shiro shook his head. “I’m not sure that would be enough to get them to open the door.”

“I have an idea,” Pidge started, her tone touched with the same hesitancy Shiro’s had been earlier. “But you’re not going to like it.”

Lance made a muffled sound of frustration. “Is this another trust exercise thing? Because trying to keep all of you from getting yourselves maimed is hard enough without the team genius chiming in.”

“Lance, enough,” Shiro cut him off. “What’s the idea, Pidge?”

She fidgeted with the reader in her suit, looking at the ground rather than meeting Shiro’s eyes. “When they threw us in here and said that line about shipping us off to Zarkon, they ignored all of us except Shiro. What if they really want the Black Paladin and the rest of us are just…extra?”

“Zarkon does seem to hate you especially,” Hunk conceded. Shiro couldn’t help but agree.

“Nice theory, but where are you going with this?” Keith asked.

Pidge hesitated for a moment before speaking in a rush. “If they’re so set on sending Shiro back to Zarkon, what would they do if they thought he was hurt?”

Shiro thought for a moment. “Not a bad plan. How do we convince them?”

“Without actually hurting him,” Keith added forcefully.

Pidge rolled her eyes. “Do I have to do all the thinking for everyone on this team?”

Lance snorted. “So, Shiro, how good are you at faking it?”

Shiro was spared his usual response to Lance’s off-color jokes when Keith elbowed the blue paladin hard enough to make him stumble. 

“ _Ow,_ dude!”

“I’ll make it work,” Shiro answered, trying to keep his voice as neutral as possible. “Hunk, you take the side by the door. Whoever comes through, stop them. If that doesn’t work, I’ll back you up.” He re-activated the arm blade for emphasis. “Keith, Lance, you get ready to run through the door and grab whatever weapons you can find.”

“And me?” Pidge asked. 

“Find us a way out of here and back to the lions. If we get the bayards and helmets on the way, all the better.”

Pidge nodded and continued analyzing whatever data her suit had picked up. The others moved into position. 

“So…how do we start this?” Lance asked, glancing at Shiro.

Hunk lifted a fist and pounded on the door. “Hey! Our friend is hurt! You know, the Black Paladin? He’s bleeding everywhere! I think he might be dead!” 

“Did you get this from Coran? Because you’re terrible at it,” Keith muttered.

Under his breath, Hunk commanded, “Whimper or scream or something, would you?”

Shiro hesitated. He was an alright actor, but something about faking a scream felt…uncomfortable, to say the least. He wasn’t sure if he could pull it off convincingly, especially with half his team staring at him expectantly.

Someone outside the door hit it, hard. “Quiet in there!”

“I’m serious, man! He looks really bad! He’s hurt too much to _make any noise!_ ” He glared at Shiro on the last words, making a “what are you waiting for” gesture.

Another bang on the outside of the door. “Shut it!”

Lance nudged him. “C’mon, dude, do something!”

It came to him in an instant – the panic he’d felt earlier. He remembered how the restraints had cut off his blood flow, the way the guard had sneered about sending him back to Zarkon, the idea of the witch getting him back in her laboratory – and having his friends there too.

Screaming was easier then.

The others looked at him in mild horror. But the plan worked – an angry guard slammed the door open, only to run straight into Hunk’s fist. Lance and Keith were out the door before he could react, reaching for whatever weapons they could find, while Shiro and Hunk stepped over the unconscious guard and attacked the others who started up from their seats across the hallway. 

“Go right!” Pidge yelled, following. Lance tossed Shiro a stolen blaster and took off running behind Keith. The rest were close behind, and Pidge called directions as Lance and Keith knocked guards out of the way. “One more left—there!”

Lance yipped when he saw they’d found the helmets and bayards in a neat stack, Allura’s tinny voice a mix of equal parts fury and fear as she yelled over the comms line. ( _“Paladins if one of you doesn’t answer me in the next five doboshes I am coming down there and if this isn’t a quiznaking emergency I’ll schedule surprise drills every varga for the next spiculian movement—”_ )

“We’re here, Allura,” Keith answered, fitting his helmet back on. Shiro and the others did the same.

“There _you are! I wasn’t sure if you were in danger, ignoring me, or if Pidge had done something to the communications lines!_ ”

“Nothing to worry about, Princess,” Lance crowed. “Just a minor delay.”

“ _You don’t have time to waste. A Galra warship is headed towards your location at full speed. Get to the lions and destroy it – whatever is happening on planet will have to wait._ ”

“Guess they weren’t kidding about sending us to Zarkon,” Hunk muttered.

“Pidge, how far are we from the lions?” Shiro asked, ignoring Hunk’s comment and the way his stomach dropped.

“Not far – we can get there in about ten doboshes if we run.”

“Let’s run, then – we need Voltron!”

**

It turned out that destroying the warship was just the first task in a long list. By the time they’d sorted out that the local leaders had a habit of using fake distress signals to lure in good-hearted rebels, that the so-called renegades were a faction trying to free the planet from its Galra-complicit leaders, and that the alchemists had fled the capital of their own free will, Shiro already felt ready to sleep for a week. 

But then there were loyalists to round up and locals sympathetic to Voltron to put in power. When they finally landed the lions in their hangars he could barely keep his eyes open – only to receive a terse order from Allura to report to the bridge _immediately._ He spared a brief moment to fantasize about a hot shower and a nap before leaving Black’s cockpit.

He reached the bridge to find that the other paladins looked as exhausted as he felt, and Shiro was the only one who bothered trying to stand at something resembling attention. Pidge had collapsed on the shallow step, Lance was sprawled out on Hunk’s stomach, and Keith was only upright because he leaned against the wall. Allura, on the other hand, looked as fresh and energetic as she always did.

And _furious._

“Now, paladins,” she began in the calm tone that always promised a storm, “let us discuss how this < _simple_ mission became such a thorough mundifer’s nest of a calamity.”

Lance groaned, and Shiro felt a sinking feeling that it would be hours before any of them got a nap.

**

He was right – by the time Allura had finished making them rehash every misstep and come up with six separate contingency plans in case they encountered a similar situation, it was nearly lights out. The other paladins looked at least as tired as he felt as they wearily followed Coran’s order to eat something before they passed out; Keith even dozed off with his spoon halfway to his face. The others went straight to bed, Lance uncharacteristically commenting that cleaning up wasn’t worth it before sleep. Shiro at least managed a quick shower before he collapsed. 

But he woke up after a few hours and then couldn’t stop himself from running through the day’s events over and over. Why hadn’t he listened to Pidge when she said something was wrong? Would Keith have made the same mistakes, if he’d been in command?

And that was another thing – something Keith had said, during the hours of debriefing the mission. 

“Look, I don’t know for sure, and I don’t have evidence,” he’d said with a shrug. “But I was watching the way the locals were talking when we first got there, and it seemed like something changed midway through.”

“You’re gonna have to give us a little more than that, man,” Hunk had interjected; they were tired enough that even Hunk’s patience was wearing thin. 

Keith had rolled his eyes. “The way they were talking at first, I don’t think they were going to give us up to Zarkon. But then something happened, and they started having an argument, and when they came back they sent us to that cave where we got caught.”

“So?” Lance had prompted, his voice doubtful.

“So something changed. Someone made a convincing argument, or they got new information that made them change their course of action,” Pidge had answered.

“Even if that’s the case, we have no idea what changed their minds,” Shiro had said. “It’s not going to help to dwell on it with the information we have now.”

And he’d been telling the truth – he didn’t think it was important. But now he wondered: was Keith right? And more importantly, what had Shiro missed?

He wondered for the thousandth time if he would manage save the universe and still get the others out of this mess alive.

He took a deep breath and forced himself to think about the feeling of the air hitting his lungs, the rise and fall of his chest, anything grounding. That kind of thinking wasn’t going to keep them safe, or wrest the universe from Zarkon’s control. What might help (and what might help him sleep better) was going a few hard rounds with a gladiator, Allura’s mice keeping track of him or no. With a grimace, he suppressed the thought that the princess was right, and that, since the team had found him a few weeks before, he was spending more and more nights with whatever busywork he could find or making his way to the training deck.

The halls were silent as he padded up a few levels. It was four hours into the sleep cycle after an exhausting day, after all – even Allura’s mice appeared to be sleeping. And that made it even more surprising when he found Rose in the training room, jumping to her feet at the quiet glide of the door.

Shiro started as well, but recovered quickly. “Hey. Didn’t expect to see you here.”

Rose let out a long breath. “Sorry. You scared me.”

He frowned, taking in the sweat stains under her arms and the sheen on her forehead. “Did Coran clear you to exercise?”

Rose pursed her lips instead of answering. Shiro tried to keep his frustration from showing. He’d just wanted to not _think_ for a while. He already had a crew of teenagers to look after; he didn’t need another person to check up on. 

But he stifled that irritation, the same way he did earlier, and instead admonished, “You should be careful, you don’t want to overwork yourself—”

Rose rolled her eyes. “I’m being careful.” After a pause, she asked, “Why are you up? You must be exhausted after today.”

He stifled the start of a smile. Redirection – he knew that trick and did it better. “You heard about that, huh?”

She shrugged, folding her arms over her chest self-consciously. He wondered why for a moment – if he’d done something to spook her – and suddenly realized how cold the training deck was. He felt the back of his neck heat up and tried to look nonchalantly anywhere but straight in front of him.

Luckily Rose took the bait, giving him a moment to recover. “Coran asked for a hand with some of the controls. I was in the bridge for most of it. He tipped me off that I might want to be gone before you all got back, though.” 

Knowing that Rose had heard their entire botched mission gave him another reason to blush. 

“If it makes you feel better,” she continued, “I’ve got a couple stories about Yabani and Miguel getting in some stupid situations – not nearly as heroic, though. Mostly over poker games in seedy bars, really.”

He chuckled. “Probably not the stories they’d want you telling.” 

She smiled a little. “All the more reason to. Besides. You got out, that’s the important part. Lived to fight another day.”

“I suppose so.” Somehow the conversation had become too personal, though Shiro had barely said anything. How had that happened? He decided to go back on the attack, choosing his words carefully before speaking. “So are you an early riser, or just enjoy exercising in the middle of the night?”

Rose grimaced. “I figured there’d be fewer witnesses. And I wanted to…assess the damage, I guess.”

He frowned. “Damage?”

Rose seemed almost embarrassed, biting her lip before answering, “How out of shape I am.”

He raised his eyebrows. “You were just freed after years in a Galra prison. Your body needs time to recover, Rose. The cryopods can’t change that.”

She reached for a water packet nearby and settled on the ground, resting her elbows on her knees. “I know that. But I wanted a baseline for how bad it is.” She used the hem of her shirt to wipe her face. Shiro looked away as soon as he saw a flash of skin. “And of course, it’s bad.” Her voice cracked a little on the last word. 

For half a second Shiro debated ignoring the sound, saying goodnight, and leaving her to her thoughts. Instead he upbraided himself for being uncaring and sat down next to her. “Do you want to talk?” he asked softly.

Rose hesitated. “My muscles are shot, even after the cryopod,” she answered. “It’s not surprising. But it doesn’t feel good to find out. I can run a little bit, but I get out of breath fast. It makes me wonder if the artificial atmosphere was safe or if my lungs are just going to be shit forever.” After a moment, she added, “I used to be a runner on Earth. Not marathons or anything, but I ran a couple miles most days. And now—” she laughed sardonically – “I couldn’t even run if someone was after me.”

Shiro thought for a moment before answering, doing his best not to remember how even the first day he’d been in the Castle he’d pushed himself to become stronger, _faster,_ as some kind of insurance so he wouldn’t get caught unprepared again. “It’ll take time, but those are things you can change.” 

“Yeah, I guess so.” She rubbed her forehead, not noticing the delay in his response. “It’s just hard to remind myself that what’s happening now won’t be forever.” 

Shiro didn’t know what to say to that, so he didn’t answer. After a moment, Rose broke the silence. “Can I ask you something?” 

“Sure,” he answered, wary.

“When you…got out. How did you get back to normal?”

Shiro scoffed. “I never got back to normal. I got dragged into space by a giant robot cat and ended up leading a bunch of teenagers in an intergalactic war to save the universe.”

Rose gave a frustrated exhale. “Okay, I didn’t word that well. What I meant was, what did you do to function like a…semi-normal person?” Shiro glanced at her; she was looking at the ground rather than him. “I just...I don’t know how to interact with people anymore. No matter what I do I just keep saying the _exact wrong thing._ ” The frustration in her voice grew, and the words were tumbling out in a flood. “And I know I should trust you all, and I want to, but I _can’t._ I know that’s irrational,” she said quickly as Shiro opened his mouth to protest. “But it’s been so long since I could trust anyone, except Matak, and now I feel like I don’t know how to respond to kindness. I don’t know how to _fix_ it.”

Shiro remembered feeling something like that. Standing outside Keith’s shack and bracing himself for the questions that he couldn’t answer. Suppressing the urge to pull away when Keith touched his arm and the unexpected comfort he’d found in the contact when he’d managed not to. Reminding himself about social cues like shaking hands. Feeling lost and overwhelmed and so confused by things that used to be normal, but desperately trying to hold himself together, because any option except keeping control was far more terrifying.

“It just takes time.” He almost winced. Those weren’t the words he wanted. Did the words he wanted exist? Probably not. 

Well, words weren’t everything. Tentatively, he rested his human hand on her shoulder, watching her face for any sign of discomfort with the contact. He didn’t see any – instead, Rose seemed to relax a bit, like he’d hoped she might. “You’ll learn to be all right.”

She made a noise of disbelief. “Will I? I feel like a broken mess.”

“You will.” He paused for a moment, choosing his words. “It won’t happen overnight. But you’ve made it this far already. And some of that was luck, but you had to have a will to survive to make it this long. That didn’t go away.” He hesitated, then added, teasing, “I mean, you’re here pushing yourself in the middle of the night instead of sleeping.” 

She gave him a slight smile. “That sounds like a not-subtle hint to go to bed.”

“You guessed right.” He returned the smile. “See? You know how to – what did you say? – interact with people. We had a whole conversation and you were fine.”

Rose chuckled. His hand was still on her shoulder – she reached up and gave it a quick squeeze before standing up. Shiro started a little at the unexpected gesture.

“Thanks. It means a lot. Really. And I get it, I’ll get to bed.” She rolled her head to one side, closing her eyes for a moment before continuing, “I’m guessing you’re not taking your own advice about getting some rest?”

Shiro gave a shake of his head. “I just want to get a quick workout in,” he answered, not meeting her eyes. He started stretching his arms.

Rose looked skeptical. “Right. I guess I’ll leave you to it.” She started toward the door, then stopped. “By the way.” 

Shiro looked up from the spinal twist he’d just started. “Yes?”

Rose’s cheeks flushed. “Today. You kept your head in a bad situation.” She paused again. “I wouldn’t have been able to, if I – if they caught me again. You did well. I’m impressed.”

Shiro shook his head even as his felt his face getting warm, remembering all his mistakes. More than he had a few minutes before, he felt willing to admit just how much had gone wrong. “It was a mess. We’re lucky we made it out at all.”

“But you did.”

He sighed, and before he knew it, he was babbling, speaking just as quickly as Rose had been a little while before. “If they had a leader who actually knew what he was doing—”

“Bullshit.” Rose’s voice was as definitive as a slammed door. “You kept your head and you did well.” Another pause. “From what I heard you reminded me of Yabani today. I can’t give a higher compliment than that.”

Shiro opened his mouth to object, but the look on Rose’s face stopped him. Her expression was clear – she wouldn’t appreciate him trying to shrug off a comparison to someone so important to her. So he changed course. “Thanks.”

Rose nodded and left. Shiro gave himself a few seconds to focus, then reminded himself why he’d come in the first place and stood up to program the gladiator.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I...did not mean for this to take 4 and a half months. Have 10,000 words and call it good? 
> 
> Also, I added the Shiro/OC tag. Please don't hate me. I didn't want folks who strenuously object to OCs to be misled. I hope to make it more about the team and Shiro than Rose, but...well... *shrugs*


End file.
